About Us
Judy Benjamin Henderson is the Founder and CEO of Empowerment Resource Associates, Inc. (ERA) a licensed community based outpatient mental and behavioral health clinic. ERA is the first African American female owned and operated outpatient clinic in Southeastern Pennsylvania. The Philadelphia and Chester County offices serve as community education sites for practicum, volunteer and work study opportunities for various Pennsylvania universities. She is also the founder of the Resource Initiatives Giving Hope through Training (RIGHT) Foundation; a community based 501 (c)(3) social service agency dedicated to preventing the spread of chronic degenerative diseases namely HIV/AIDS, hypertension, and diabetes through education. Judy’s educational background consists of a Bachelor’s Certification in Business Administration from LaSalle College; a Masters Degree in Human Services from The Lincoln University; a Master of Science Degree in Organizational Dynamics from the University of Pennsylvania; and a Post Masters Certification in Marriage and Family Therapy from Drexel University.
An international trainer and public speaker, Judy has led motivational workshops at the U.S. Postal Service, The Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, the National Minority AIDS Council, The Balm in Gilead, and The University of Mississippi, just to name a few. She has also provided ministry consultations in Africa; working closely with the Ministers of Health, in Ghana, Senegal, and Nigeria. Her latest book is “Entrepreneurial Ministry – The Catalyst to Community Social Change.” She is also the author of “The Empowerment Link Project” a faith-based Crisis Intervention Partnership Program written for the Department of Behavioral Health, Greater Harvest Evangelistic Church and Interstate Realty. Additionally, she has written articles for the “Continue Care Coordinator” magazine; and the healthcare industry Newsletter “The Proclamation”. She is also a founding member of “Playback Theater for Social Change” an improvisational drama team designed to bring community peace and reconciliation. Most recently, Judy was a workshop presenter at the American Psychological Association in Denver Colorado. She is a committed advocate for community social change.
Mission
The mission of the clinic is to provide quality family focused therapy and support services for individuals and families from ages 14 years old and upward. Because ERA believes that all individuals possess valuable unique qualities, services are provided from a strength-based approach utilizing evidenced based treatments that empowers the client to become their best self. Through this Philosophy, everyone can recover.
Who Are We?
Empowerment Resource Associates, Inc. (ERA) is a licensed outpatient psychiatric clinic dedicated to strengthening families and individuals. Therapeutic and case management services are offered to adolescents, adults and older adults individually, as couples, and as families in a safe environment. ERA employs highly qualified professional staffs who provide person centered services that meet the unique needs of individuals from a strength based approach. “To become your best self” is our goal.
Why Choose Us?
ERA has developed program services from an integrative approach by utilizing best practices from other nationally recognized treatment models. In addition, ERA has a long tradition of using evidence-based practices. It has been the goal of the organization to focus on evidenced-based practices, believing these practices to be the primary manner to promote cultural competency or at least decrease the deleterious effects of culturally inappropriate service delivery.
It is our belief that the use of evidence-based practices at minimum, potentially offers interventions that have included people of color in their study sample. In this way, the ERA clinician is less vulnerable to making culturally inappropriate errors than if such interventions were not used. We, at ERA, are under no illusion that the use of evidence-based practices alone are sufficient to achieve cultural competence; hence, the ERA clinician is taught that each “evidence-based practice” should be questioned on issues of demographics as well as issues such as the consistency of the basic principle of the model to cultural predilections of the group to which it is being applied.
