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“I am working with girls who have been sexually or physically abused, who must learn to trust. Many of their parents are drug addicts. They have real emotional and behavioral problems,” says Keri Grunther ’00, a psychology major from Medford, N.J., and a graduate of Morristown Beard High School. “I like working with the girls, but it has been an awakening. What you read in textbooks is not always what you face in the real world. I have a better appreciation for my own life and my own good fortune.”
If home is where the heart is, then Keri Grunther is right at home at The Children’s Home of Easton. She is serving an internship in which she’s giving heart and soul to the home’s teenage clients.
She’s doing the internship under the auspices of her class in advanced applied psychology, an internship-based course for juniors and seniors majoring or minoring in psychology.
It is taught by Mary Ann Swiatek, assistant professor of psychology, whose clinical training and interests focus on behaviorally and emotionally disturbed children and adolescents. She also teaches introduction to psychology and accompanying lab; abnormal psychology, educational psychology, and child psychopathology. Her research focuses on intellectually gifted children and adolescents.
“I work on Monday mornings in the office with a caseworker,” Grunther explains. “I attend staff meetings, help out with the case reports, and read the files of the girls I am working with. On Thursdays, I go to the girls unit. I work with all of the girls. I am there through dinner and then we have a group activity.”
She says working directly with the troubled teens has been the most exciting and most challenging dimension of the experience.
“The girls have 90 minutes of free time before dinner. I hang out with them and we get to talk about serious things and about light things,” she says. “After dinner time, they have a quiet hour in their rooms and I go around and talk with them, help with their homework.
“After quiet hour, there is a mandatory group activity which can range from roller skating to bowling to a pizza night with a movie,” she continues. “Sometimes we play games, split the girls into teams. The competition helps bring us all closer together.”
Her interaction with the girls is giving her insight into counseling and providing them with a role model.
“I am working with girls who have been sexually or physically abused, who must learn to trust,” she says. “Many of their parents are drug addicts. They have real emotional and behavioral problems.
“I like going there, working with the girls, but it has been an awakening. What you read in textbooks is not always what you face in the real world,” she continues. “I have a better appreciation for my own life and my own good fortune.”
Jean Mazzerese, a staff counselor at the Children’s Home, is Grunther’s internship supervisor.
“Keri came to the Children’s Home somewhat unsure of what we do. She has more understanding and knowledge now of our work,” Mazzarese says. “She’s found the work is sometimes difficult. She works specifically with girls who have developed an outer wall. She has come to realize that working with children who have been sexually abused takes compassion without ever losing sight of professional boundaries.”
Grunther, who also volunteers at Lehigh Valley Child Care’s campus day-care center, plans to enter the human resources field in New York City after graduation. She says she may pursue graduate school after that. But she is also thinking about the possibility of continuing her work with troubled teens.
“If I stay in the field, I would like to work with girls ages 12 to 17,” she says.
Another Side of Keri
Grunther did a summer internship at Seventeen magazine in New York. She’s a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority.