About GTC

About GTC

The Guidance and Training Center for the Child and Family (GTC) was founded in November 1994 . it has been operating as a mental health center since its inception in Bethlehem. The center is registered as a Palestinian local nongovernmental organization (NGO) by the palestinian Ministry of Interior since 1997.
Before travel restrictions were imposed, GTC served patients from as far as the Nablus area and even Gaza. Now, it provides services to patients from the Bethlehem area including the surrounding villages, refugee camps, and nearby cities including Ramallah, Jericho, Hebron and East Jerusalem.

The Mental Health Team includes psychiatrists, psychologists, special education therapist, play therapist, social workers and occupational therapists. The Center offers eclectic mental health care including psychiatric and psychological services, special education therapy, play therapy, psychosocial counseling, training, research, outreach services and special education classrooms. Patients receive individual therapy (psychodynamic, behavioral, special education and play therapy) as well as family therapy and group therapy.
GTC is a mental health center mainly for children and their families. GTC deals with all kinds of emotional, psychological and psychiatric problems. It is open to patients of all ages regardless of sex and religion. However, most patients who come for treatment are children and women, where about 85% of patients are children and women.

From November 1994 until the end of December 2008, the Center provided about 62,431 mental health sessions. In the year 2008 alone, GTC served 400 patients of which 274 were children (167boys and 107 girls) and provided 5043 patient consultations. The more common diagnoses in the past year among new patients were Academic Problems, PTSD Delayed Onset, Developmental Delay – Partial, and Depressive Disorders.

The Center conducts research and provides clinical training through its mental health course and internship training for university students. GTC is assisted by several consultant psychiatrists and psychologists in the mental health course.

GTC also provides income-generating activities to women patients and mothers of patients. This is a therapeutic and an income generating activity. This started when a 35 year-old female patient threatened to kill herself and her family because she couldn’t feed her children other than the one she was breast feeding during her therapy session. The Center assisted her by giving her some cloth, thread and needles aside from her therapy sessions. Thus, the GTC income-generating program was born. From June 2002 until December 2007, about 125 women benefited from this program.

As a non-profit NGO, the GTC depends mostly on third party donations to carry on with its services to the Palestinian community in the West Bank. It needs financial support for its continued operation.

Latest News

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Training

The Guidance and Training Center for the Child and Family (GTC) is in a process organizing a five day training workshop in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) which will cover subjects already given in part 1 and 2, and will be given by Dr. Samah Jabr, Psychiatrist – co-facilitator of the two previous workshops. The training aims to enlarge the number of Palestinian professionals who would benefit from the ongoing CBT program of GTC. The objective of the training workshop is to prepare participants to catch-up with part 3 that will given by Dr. Alan Kessedjian – Certified Trainer / Supervisor with the British Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP).

Training is targeting mental health workers (preferably Psychologists and Social Workers) who intend to use CBT in their practice.

We would like to kindly ask you to nominate candidates for the workshop. Due to limited places, a committee will review resumes to choose candidates for the training.

Please send your candidates resumes to:
Email: gtc@gtc.ps
Not later than Saturday 21 August 2010.

The training workshop will take place at GTC; 21-25 September 2010
Please note that a fee will be requested for each participant.

GTC Staff Members Back from PTSD Workshop in Germany

In continuation of the training program in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) which started in winter 2008, and organized by Wings of Hope, three of the staff members of GTC came back after attending a one week workshop with several Palestinian and German professionals. The workshop concentrated on practical applications on trauma healing and was held in Munich – Germany.
GTC would like to congratulate Ms. Hunaida Said - Educational and Psychological Counselor, Ms. Rania Mukarker-Ghneim - Social Worker/Play therapy, and Mr. Murad Butma - Educational and Psychological Counselor on their achievement. We send our appreciation to Wings of Hope for their support and helping our staff enhance their therapeutic skills.

General Assembly Annual Meeting - New Board of Directors Elected

The general assembly of GTC held its annual meeting on Saturday 17 April 2010, in the presence of the representative of the Palestinian Ministry of Interior. The meeting started with welcoming and explaining the agenda of the meeting by Ms. Vera Baboun – Chairperson of the Board of Directors, following two presentations where given by Mr. Victor Kawwas – Administrative and Financial Director, and Dr. Samah Jabr – Director of Mental Health Services explaining the achievements of GTC during the year 2009. The attendees discussed both the Annual Administrative report and the Financial Audit report for the year 2009, and approved them. Following, a new Board of Directors for the Guidance and Training Center for the Child and Family was Elected for the period of 2010 – 2013. The positions of the board where elected during the first official meeting of the new board, and the results where as following:

Ms. Vera Baboun – President
Dr. Nael Abdel Rahman – Vice President
Dr. Degaulle Hodali – Secretary
Mr. Michel Rahil - Treasurer
Ms. Mariam Samara Awad – Member
Mr. Vladimair Kharoufe - Member
Ms. Liana Hadweh - Member
Dr. Fouad Bannoura – Member
Mr. Sameeh Sallam – Member

We would like to wish the new board members good luck in their mission to serve the center, its beneficiaries, and the family of GTC.

Part Two of CBT Training Workshop Starts at GTC

The second part of the Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) training course started on Monday 22 March 2010, and is taking place over four continues days. The first part of this training was initiated by the Guidance and Training Center for the Child and Family (GTC) last November, which is given on a voluntary basis by Dr. Alan Kessedjian – certified trainer / Supervisor with the British Association of Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP). It is being attended by GTC staff and other professionals from different Palestinian organizations working in the field of mental health. The training was designed to meet the needs professionals who are committed to applying the CBT training in their daily practice. The GTC highly appreciates the efforts of Dr. John Gleisner in making this valuable training possible.

GTC Employee of the Year Award

GTC family has celebrated the awarding of the Employee of the Year at the center. The awards came as a result of the annual evaluation that the center conducts for its staff members for the previous year. The evaluation aims to reflect the individual professionalism and achievements of staff members, and their contributions to the success of the center and its team work. Ms. Hunaida Isead was awarded the title employee of the year for her highly appreciated professional work within the mental health team for the year 2009, and Ms. Natalie Bandak was awarded the title administrative employee of the year 2009 for her remarkable contribution. In addition, Mr. Murad Butmeh was also awarded the title employee of the year 2008.
The Board of Directors of GTC awarded the three employees a certificate and a symbolic appreciation gift in a ceremony that took place at GTC.