Culturally-Affirming Boundary Setting: Clinical Guidance on Working with First and Second Gen Clients of Color
Friday, March 13, 2026
9:30am-11:30am
with Pauline Yeghnazar Peck, MA, MMFT, PhD
2 CE credits
Online via Zoom
(link will be sent in confirmation and reminder emails)
in collaboration with Central Coast Chapter
Description
Culturally Affirming Boundary Setting with First- and Second-Generation Clients is a continuing education workshop that challenges the dominant, white, Western, and individualistic frameworks through which boundary setting is typically taught in clinical training and practiced in clinical settings. While traditional models often prioritize autonomy, separation, and individuation, these approaches can be misaligned - or even harmful - when applied uncritically to clients from immigrant families, where relational identity, interdependence, hierarchy, high-context communication, and real material and caregiving needs shape family dynamics. This workshop invites clinicians to move beyond a one-size-fits-all model of “healthy boundaries” and instead examine how boundaries function differently within collectivist, intergenerational, and migration-shaped systems. Through a culturally responsive and trauma-informed lens, participants will learn how to support clients in discerning what boundaries are right for them, not in opposition to their culture, but in relationship with it. The training will explore the different cultural conceptualization of I and We, family roles and hierarchies, systemic pressures, and survival-based expectations that influence boundary decisions for first- and second-generation clients. Clinicians will be introduced to practical strategies and language that help clients set boundaries that preserve dignity, connection, and cultural integrity. Emphasis will be placed on flexibility, values-alignment, and relational attunement, equipping clinicians to facilitate boundary work that honors both individual well-being and collective belonging as determined by their clients.
Educational Goals/Learning Objectives
At the end of this presentation, attendees will be able to:
- Identify four key principles of culturally affirming boundary setting with first- and second-generation clients.
- Name four culturally congruent ways boundaries can be set within collectivistic and immigrant family systems.
- State three reasons why traditional Western models of boundary setting may be misapplied or harmful when working with clients from immigrant families.
- Identify four ways clinicians’ own cultural conditioning, training, countertransference, and value systems may become activated during boundary-setting work.
Presenter
Dr. Pauline Yeghnazar Peck is a first generation Iranian-Armenian trauma-informed psychologist who specializes in working with the children of immigrants and intercultural couples. She focuses on the ways that culture impacts mental health, supporting clients in actively engaging with the goodness available in their culture while also doing the work of breaking cycles of intergenerational trauma. She operates a group practice in California called Noor Therapy and Wellness specializing in providing culturally-informed, trauma-informed care for children of immigrants/BIPOC folks, as well as provides coaching, speaking, consulting, and community education through her company Bridging Gaps, Breaking Cycles.
Other Details
Time: 9:30am-11:30pm
Location: Online via Zoom (link will be sent in confirmation and reminder emails)
Cost:
Non-member $30
Chapter Member $25
Associate Member $20
Student Member $15
For questions, more information, accommodations: contact us at sacramentocamft@gmail.com. You may also contact Programs Co-Chairs Roque Neto at ramorimneto@paloaltou.edu and Iris McAlpin at iris@irismcalpin.com.
This is an introductory, intermediate, and advanced level course. This program will benefit LMFT, LPCC, LEP and LCSW licensees and pre-licensees. Open to all mental health professionals, both members and non-members.
This course meets the qualifications for 2 hours of continuing education credit for LMFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and/or LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences. The Sacramento Valley Chapter of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (SVC-CAMFT), provider #62279, is approved by CAMFT to sponsor continuing education for LMFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and LEPs. SVC-CAMFT maintains the responsibility for the program and all its content.
CE credit will be awarded via email after the completion of the course in exchange for a course evaluation. No CE credits will be awarded to persons not attending the presentation in it's entirety. Partial CE credit will not be awarded.
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