Article archive / September 2017
Originally published: . Volume 8, No. 9. Source pages: 15, 16.
Dr. Sonnier-Hillis to Help Guide Career Fair at BCRR for Mental Health Awareness Week
Dr. Bridget Sonnier-Hillis, interim department chair for Social Sciences and History and a member of Baton Rouge Community College’s Behavioral Intervention Team, is helping coordinate resources for an event she hopes will help bring together people for mental health awareness in Louisiana.
The Baton Rouge Community College (BRCC) will host its first-ever Mental Health and Social Services Career Information Fair on Wednesday, October 11, Dr. Sonnier-Hillis explained.
To coordinate with Mental Health Awareness Week activities and, in an effort to address the shortage of mental health professionals in the area, Baton Rouge Community College will host the Career Fair on BRCC’s campus at 201 Community College Drive in the beautiful Magnolia Building, Sonnier-Hillis said.
Presentations will be in Dumas Room from 10 am to 1pm and will include a guest panel of mental health professionals from various fields at 12 pm, she said.
“Students and the general public will be able to learn about jobs and various career opportunities in the Baton Rouge area that range from registered line technicians to work with children on the Autism Spectrum and assistant behavior analysts,” Sonnier- Hillis said, “to substance abuse counselors and peer support specialists, school psychologists, and social workers. The various specialties in psychology also will be presented,” she said.
Dr. Sonnier-Hillis is a licensed psychologist with over a decade of experience working in the area of clinical health psychology, practicing in various medical settings in Texas and Nebraska before returning to her home state of Louisiana in 2011, and she now teaches full-time at BRCC.
She noted that Baton Rouge Community College began in 1998 and has an enrollment of approximately 8,000 students. Among its many degrees it offers an Associate of Arts Louisiana Transfer degree in the Social Sciences. This degree allows students to take their first two years of coursework at BRCC and then transfer to a four-year university as a junior, and obtain a bachelor’s degree in any of the social science fields such as psychology, sociology, social work, etc., Dr. Sonnier-Hillis explained.
BRCC offers associate’s degrees in other academic areas such as the biological sciences, pre-engineering, pre-nursing computer science, liberal arts, and business. “Students also have many opportunities for community involvement, community service, and the development of leadership skills,” she said. “The Social Sciences Department recently hosted a screening of the award-winning documentary ‘Alive Inside’ about the evidence-based program called Music and Memory, based on the usage of individualized music playlists in nursing homes to help reduce the use of antipsychotics.
Dr. Sonnier-Hillis is the Louisiana Department of Health’s designated state reviewer for Louisiana 2008 Act 571, which ensures quality dementia training curricula for nursing facility employees. She also recently was a member of the academic committee for police policy improvements initiated by members of the Baton Rouge Metro Council, making recommendations regarding police interactions with those with mental illness, as well as the effects of implicit biases. She is a member of the Louisiana Psychological Association, the American Psychological Association, and Louisiana Enhancing Aging with Dignity through Empowerment and Respect (LEADER).
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