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Trust-Based Relational Intervention®
Trust-Based Relational Intervention® (TBRI®), a holistic model developed by Dr. Karyn Purvis and Dr. David Cross of TCU, has achieved worldwide recognition as a leading evidence-based practice for working with children. Westview began working with TBRI early in its history; today we keep growing with the program. Westview currently has three TBRI practitioners on its team; all Westview team members (including office staff) are TBRI trained and caregivers receive ongoing training in TBRI.
In 2006, Dr. Ron Bruner, Westview’s Executive Director, first met Dr. Karyn Purvis from Texas Christian University (TCU) and listened to her presentations on “Brain Research with At-Risk Youth.” He shared this information with Westview staff, aware that Dr. Purvis planned to publish her work soon.
In 2007, Dr. Purvis and Dr. Cross of TCU published “The Connected Child” with McGraw-Hill. This book clearly laid out strategies to help parents cope with challenging parenting issues. Bruner bought a copy for every Westview caregiver. The strategies outlined in the book make up the components of what was later named, Trust-Based Relational Intervention (2009).
Essentially TBRI empowers:
- better and trustful bonding between child and caregiver
- improved management of learning and behavioral issues
- loving discipline that avoids the child perceiving the adult to be threatening or unsafe.
During the summer of 2011, TCU hosted a TBRI Practitioner Training for professionals. Westview sent two team members: Terry Owens and Shiann Metheny. When they returned, they immediately began training Westview team members in this method. It has powerfully affected our work. TBRI can be counter-intuitive to how many understand parenting and therefore is a gradual shift of culture and practice that requires a great deal of intentionality. Every Westview caregiver since has received ongoing TBRI training as a part of their work.
In the spring of 2016, Dr. Purvis passed away but her peers and students have continued her work. In December 2016, the TCU Institute of Child Development was renamed the Karyn Purvis Institute of Child Development, in honor of its’ late founder and director. Under the leadership of co-founder and Rees-Jones Director, Dr. David Cross, TBRI has become an increasingly helpful tool for counselors, teachers, parents, foster parents, and caregivers.
Josh Birney and Chase Thompson underwent the rigorous training necessary to become TBRI Practitioners in April of 2017. Their practice of TBRI will connect with caregivers and the young men at Westview, and with the parents and families of the young men in our care.
Westview Boys’ Home continues to seek ongoing improvement in our work with young men. We are human and we make mistakes. We are committed, however, to learning from our mistakes and becoming better at our ministry for the sake of the young men in our care and for the glory of the God we serve.
For more information about TBRI and the Karyn Purvis Institute of Child Development, please go to child.tcu.edu.