Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

Name: Katrina Hensley (Crawford)

Instructor: Nate Valez

Date: 3/25/2021

1
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

Program Learning Outcome Corresponding Course Session

Assignment Number
Ex:
AHB340

1. Human Systems & Diversity Learning

Outcome

1.1 (subsection) Understand the nature of Child Trafficking AHB – 350 Spring
human systems and apply historical PowerPoint 2021
perspectives to analyzing and solving
current social conditions that limit the
highest level of the individual or
community functioning.

1.2 (subsection) Understand multiple Diversity and AHB 390 Fall

perspectives on diversity and implement Inclusion 2020
strategies to encourage multicultural Initiative
environments that support clients,
communities, and professional
environments.

2. Practice & Intervention Learning Outcome

2.1 (subsection) Understand and apply a Crisis and Trauma AHB 450 Spring
variety of Psychological, Social Work, Training 2021
Sociological, and Urban Planning
theories to promote the optimal
functioning of individuals and
communities.

2.2 (subsection) Understand the Biological AHB 365 Fall

nature of human systems using the Foundations 2020
biopsychosocial model including the Essay
biological, environmental and social
impacts on human behavior.

2.3 (subsection) Explain aspects of Genogram AHB 450 Spring

human development, the life cycle, Mapping 2021
familial and relationship dynamics and
how they affect individual growth and

2
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

success.

2.4 (subsection) Awareness of the Mini Grant AHB 375 Spring

variety of community settings and Proposal 2021
resources and the ability to select
appropriate services and referrals that
support client well-being.

3. Community Engagement & Responsibility

learning Outcome

3.1 (subsection) Identify the impact that Ideal Social AHB 365 Fall
socioeconomics, public policy, Services 2020
community development, and global Discussion
issues have on individuals and
communities ability to resolve
psychological or social issues and
develop new strategies for success.

3.2 (subsection) Understand how Weekly AHB 375 Spring

globalization and internationalism impact Discussion 2021
citizenship, participation, and social PowerPoint –
responsibility in mezzo and macro Urbanism as a
environments and apply this knowledge Way of Life
to resolving issues of social
responsibility and citizenship.

4. Professional Preparedness Learning

Outcome

4.3(subsection) Understand the Final research AHB Fall

importance of Social Science research paper 305W 2020
and apply research to select solutions or
implement best practices.

4.4 (subsection) Awareness and capacity SWOT Analysis AHB 390 Fall
to apply the most prevalent ethical, legal, 2020
and safety guidelines for direct practice
and intervention with clients.

5. Personal Values and Development

3
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

Learning Outcome

5.1 (subsection) Explore personal and Self-Reflection AHB 375 Spring

professional values, ethics and career 2021
driven dilemmas through participation in
self-reflection and professional
exploration exercises, self-critique,
discussion and group activities.

5.2 (subsection) Develop personal Guest Speaker AHB 375 Spring

experiences, critical thinking skills and Lectures 2021
challenge current worldviews through
teamwork, self-assessment, course
projects, service learning and community
internship experience.

INTRODUCTION

4
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

The first things that I want to express is how the assignments, professors, and learnings
from the Applied Human Behavior courses have cemented my decision to stay in Social Work.
Over the course of my higher education, which started in 2014, I have taken many different
courses that have opened other options for me career wise. While I considered going into the
medical field more than once, after these courses this past year at NAU, I do not think I could do
anything else with my life. My heart has always been in helping others, but not in the traditional
way. I much prefer to be behind the scenes, cementing rules and policies to better the agency I
am with. While I love working with the population as a Direct Care Professional, I have found
my niche in administration within a company that serves a vulnerable population. I still have
direct interactions with those I serve as well as my employees, but my real job lies in ensuring
the company’s policies are being followed and implemented. I enjoy working with others to
complete documentation protocols, ensuring the safety of all those I serve; networking with other
agencies that I work side-by-side with. In regards to career preparation verse practice, I see
personal growth in myself. I stumbled into this field as a broke teenager who just needed a job. I
have always learned by doing, not necessarily learning the correct practices, but my results were
the desired ones. Throughout these classes I have learned how to research; how to search for the
process of completing my goals and how to obtain those the correct way. I have also learned
many different practices of people, diversity, deviance, community building, etc. Each class has
given me another stepping stone to my eventual success in my chosen field!

Human Systems & Diversity

I chose to highlight subsections 1.1 and 1.2 for this portion of my artifact table. The first
subsection asks what assignment best cemented the understanding of analyzing and solving
current social conditions. The assignment I chose was the PowerPoint assignment in AHB350,
Inequality, Social Justice and Global Citizenship in the 21st century. This assignment asked us to
chose a topic from our text and complete a 16 slide PowerPoint answering questions such as:
Who, What, When, Where, and Why. It also asked us to research current global problems and
solutions that were happening in real time. The last portion of this assignment was to develop a
novel solution for the topic we chose, mine of which was Child Trafficking in Third World
Courtiers. This assignment assisted me by giving me the tools to research topics that are not
spoken of in mainstream life. I had to sift through hours of research to find the information that
was presented for this assignment. It also forced me to think of current potential solutions to a
problem, and to strain myself for a novel idea, one that was not publicized as a solution for this
current problem.
The section subsection asked for us to choose an assignment that concreted an
understanding of diversity and implement strategies to encourage multicultural environments.
This assignment came easily to me; the Diversity and Inclusion Initiative assignment in our AHB
390 class. This class, Diverse Work Environments, explored that diversity that our world thrives
on and how our cultures affect us in our daily lives. The assignment asked us to choose a website
5
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

and complete an analysis to determine whether it was: accessible to all individuals, as well as the
company’s diversity in general. I looked through multiple websites before landing on the one I
chose, Carl Hayden’s Veterans Affairs hospital. I was able to learn valuable skills such as
scrutinizing agencies in order to determine accessibility to all individuals. It also gave me many
ideas how to ensure accessibility in my own agency, both online and in person.

Practice & Intervention

I was unable to choose two assignments to describe the skills listed in this section; all
four assignments I chose are closely related to each subtopic. I am going to describe subsection
2.2 first; as it was one of my favorite assignments during the course of my studies. I thoroughly
enjoyed the class Environmental and Biological Foundations of Human Behavior; during this
class we were instructed to complete a Biological Foundations essay. For this assignment we
chose a neurological condition and complete an essay describing the condition, it’s affect on the
individual suffering with it, medication and medical solutions, and affect it can have on an
individual’s mental health. This assignment allowed me the opportunity to look into multiple
disorders and diseases that neurologically affects an individual. In this field, we work with
individuals with many different disabilities, mental health concerns, and medical conditions. It is
important to keep in mind that we never truly know what is happening inside a person’s head.
The second assignment I am going to highlight describes an understanding and awareness
of community settings and resources that will support a client’s well-being. This assignment
comes from AHB 375, which is Community Planning and Sustainable Practice, which gave us
many foundations in which a community comes together. The assignment, which I absolutely
loved doing, was to submit a Grant Proposal for a company that we would like to build or see in
our community. I chose to do a grant proposal for an interactive and adaptive indoor play facility
for those with physical and developmental disabilities along with their families. This assignment
forced me to look into agencies that offered similar service, of which there are none in my area. I
was able to look into the community I live in and work in to determine what was available for
those who may not be able to participate at “typical” establishments.

Community Engagement & Responsibility

Through the assignments that describe my learning of community engagement and

responsibility, I was able to learn not only what I community was, but how every person, animal,
and inanimate object played a part of building, furthering or destroying societies and
communities. My understanding of a society’s ability and responsibility for aiding those with
mental health concerns was furthered by the class Environmental and Biological Foundations of
Human Behavior, and more specifically the assignment in which were we instructed to create our
own Social Service agency. This discission post asked us to create an agency that offers social
services, such as medical and mental health services, to those in our community. This assignment
forced me to pull information from multiple different aspects of social services. Now that I have

6
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

completed more classes, I can look back and realize how many different aspects of these classes
I utilized during this class, even before I took them.
The second assignment, which was a weekly discussion presentation from the class
Community Planning and Sustainable Practice. This assignment asked us to read a section of our
text and essentially teach our peers the information from that text in a PowerPoint presentation.
For my presentation, I was assignment the chapter, Urbanism as a Way of Life. This looked at
the small (micro) and large (macro) affects that individuals have on communities and the affects
communities have on other communities. This cemented the idea that we all have a part to play
in our communities. During other’s presentations I learned how technology affects communities,
how individuals and modernism changes the environments of the community.

Section 4: Professional Preparedness

There was no other assignment that came to mind when I was thinking about which
assignment taught me most about research and application than our research paper in 305W. This
assignment was a lot of work and ended up being enlightening for many reasons. The first is that
I was able to choose my own topic, which was catered to children with Autism in the education
system. Through my research, I learned a lot about not only Autism in children, but the
education system in regards to individuals with developmental and physical disabilities. This
assignment allowed me to understand the importance od social science research in order to better
the lives of others in our communities.
The second assignment from section for, subsection 4, was asking to choose an
assignment enforced my understanding of awareness and ability to apply guidelines for practice
with clients. The assignment that I chose the most closely relates to this was the S.W.O.T
assignment for class AHB 390, Diverse Work Environments. For this assignment we were asked
to find a website and complete an analysis of it to determine whether or not the company and its
website was accessible to all individuals. I was able to gain skills in determining how to ensure
accessibility for all and how to aid others to ensure diversity in their workplace.

Section 5: Personal Values and Development

The final section asks us to choose assignments that have helped our personal
development. For the first subsection, we were asked to choose an assignment that explore our
personal and professional values. For this I chose the assignment from our Community Planning
and Sustainable Practice class. I chose to use the self-reflection assignment that asked us to
reflect on what we learned from this class and how we will use the information to pursue our
careers. During writing this reflection I was thinking about not just this class but those previously
that tied into my work in Social Services. It made me think of the ethics that I hold dear and how
my raising is critical to my beliefs. I truly believe that all individuals are deserving of a voice and
a say in their own lives.

7
Applied Human Behavior Program: AHB495C

The second subsections asked us to choose an assignment that made us think, gave us
critical thinking skills. The assignment I chose may not be a conventional assignment, but it was
something that I took a lot away from during class. In our class last semester, we had a lot of
guest speakers from all around Arizona and many different career paths. During these lectures
we were given the chance to ask important questions about that individuals personal life, career
choices, ideals, and how they are impacting the communities they serve. It was really a great
experience and helped me to develop critical thinking skills.

CONCLUSION

Overall, I can say that my experience in the Applied Human Behavior program has been
positive. Not only have I gained valuable experience, knowledge and skills, but I have gained
friendships and professional networking relationships. I chose this program about 2 years ago
when I was at GCC and looking to see how to get my Bachelor’s degree. I have been in the same
career field for years and had no interest in changing jobs or fields. I was honestly looking for
the quickest way to get my degree while still staying within the same kind-of field. When this
opportunity was presented to me, I took it thinking it would get me my degree while still doing
what I loved. I never imagined how much I would appreciate the courses, professors and peers
over this time. The sheer number of professional individuals that I, as a student have had to
opportunity to meet, network with and build relationships with is worth the hard work and time
that I have put into my schooling. I think that the most impactful classes that I have taken would
be diversity in the workplace, theoretical perspectives on deviant behavior, and inequality, social
justice and global citizenship in the 21st century. While every class has been helpful and has
expanded my knowledge, critical thinking skills, and problem-solving, these three classes have
had the biggest impact on my personal ethics and beliefs. My world has always been pretty small
and it still is in the grand scheme of things; but how am I supposed to make an impact on a
community that I do not understand? In order to be successful, make a difference, and help those
who need it, I need to be versed in different behaviors, cultures, and societies. It has taken 7
years to get to this point, but I am so thankful that my life has led me down this path.