Last week, I attended the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (Ontario Chapter) conference. It was inspiring and enjoyable to spend time with professionals all of whom work with families going through separation and divorce.
There were lawyers and social workers and psychologists and judges. There were individual speakers on topics ranging from challenging clients (who has those? not me) to high conflict litigation There were panels on practice and stress management, supervised access and moving difficult cases to resolution. I learned new things about parental estrangement and children who resist post-separation contact. I heard different perspectives on how to obtain the voice of the child and incorporating the child’s views and preferences in our cases. Fascinating stuff. The conference reaffirmed to me the importance of the work that we do for children and families. It also reminded me of the importance of inter-disciplinary connections and learning – we do better work when we work together.
It is always tough to make the time to attend continuing education programs and conferences. This one was well worth it.
