47.504 Family Systems
Spring 2004
The case study will be
limited in scope. The purpose of this
project is to permit you to examine policy issues related to family systems in
a community organization of interest to you.
The organization can be any community level organization, public or
private. It may be a workplace, school, recreational or social service
organization. You may select an
organization in which you have a role, but do beware of the importance of being
able to get outside your own history with, or notions about, the organization
in order to incorporate family systems frameworks.
Your task is to summarize
how the community interacts with that organization from a family systems
perspective. Remember that every
individual who interacts with an organization is part of a family.
Begin the paper by introducing
the organization and its role in the community. Proceed to summarizing relevant family policy. In what ways does the organization
accommodate to the family role of the individuals who interact with it, and in
what ways do they not accommodate? To
what types of families do they accommodate and to what types do they not?
Remember that the
organization is itself a system, and may be part of a larger hierarchical
constellation of systems (e.g., a public school as part of a school district as
part of state and federal government mandates). You will have to gather information about the organization from a
reputable source and reference that information in your paper (e.g., annual
report); make sure to use appropriate APA citation form.
After summarizing, analyze
relevant family policy from the perspectives of two stakeholders: a consumer
and a manager/owner/provider. From
each perspective, what are the costs and benefits to family friendly policies
for a diversity of family constellations?
Conclude with recommendations
for ways in which the organization might improve their family policies, why,
and what the expected result might be (e.g., better retention, less time away
from work, increased attendance, more sales).
Make sure that your rationale for linking policy and outcome is clear
from the preceding discussion.
Because this case study has
not been a continuous project from the beginning of the semester, I am not
requiring you to conduct interviews of individuals who represent the
stakeholder positions you are representing. However, this is an excellent
method for capturing the perspectives of folks who relate to the organization
in different ways than you might, and I recommend you consider doing so if at
all possible.