Meet Jacqueline Scherer, LMSW, RPT™ | Executive Director, Founder of THE PLAYGROUNDgr, Mental Health Advocate

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jacqueline Scherer, LMSW, RPT™ and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jacqueline, how does your business help the community?
The stigma that continues to impact therapy and trauma in our culture and country is deafening. I founded THE PLAYGROUNDgr to bridge the gaps needed to ensure EVERYONE had access to play therapy, regardless of finances, insurance and accessibility. Play continues to provide the building blocks to emotional health and overall wellness, creating an inclusive space to express oneself, heal and grow through a mental health lens. I believe that play therapy and generalized play, is the missing link in healing, I believe that play heals.

What should our readers know about your business?
JACQUELINE SCHERER’S BIO:

Jacqueline Scherer, LMSW, RPT™ is a seasoned professional with over twenty-three years of experience working with children, youth and families. Jacqueline is both a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and a Registered Play Therapist ™. As a foster parent for over thirteen years, and a mother to three children, Jacqueline has demonstrated her commitment to promoting healing through play, both in her home and community. Jacqueline has led various initiatives such as Stand Up For Kids Olympia, WA Chapter and Co-pioneering the first THP+ Program in San Diego, CA. She has also contributed significantly to the field by piloting a traumatic grief curriculum for children, advocating for educational rights, and serving as a crisis clinician for children in Kent County. Jacqueline’s dedication extends beyond direct practice as she actively engages in teaching and speaking engagements, sharing her expertise in grief, trauma, and play with clinicians, teachers, and community members. Her recent endeavor, THE PLAYGROUNDgr Podcast, further amplifies her mission by inviting local experts to share their insights on healing through play. Jacqueline’s passion for play therapy and play-based strategies led her to create THE PLAYGROUNDgr, driven by the belief that everyone deserves access to the healing power of play. Through her ongoing leadership roles, such as Vice Chair of the Michigan Association of Play Therapy and her leadership role as Chair of the Midtown Neighborhood Association, Jacqueline continues to advocate for safe and accessible play and play therapy services for all. “The missing link in mental and emotional health in our community is accessible access to play and play therapy, the research is clear, play heals.” – Jacqueline

Lessons learned: throughout my life:
People are good, people are kind, and people want to live healthy, meaningful lives.

What do I want the world to know about me: I am fierce, I am fabulous, I am strong and I LOVE LIFE! There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for my family, and I will never give up on the people I work alongside. I am forever a champion, and a friend to the world of play.

What do I want to share?
I began working with individuals and families in high school, finding outrage in the lack of access, compassion and overall support available to children and families in our community. Through ongoing education and experience, it quickly became clear, the system created to support emotional health and healing had to change! I dove headfirst into play based emotional health supports at the start of my career, looking at relationship based supports, natural supports and advocacy efforts in place to support children and families. Working in Kalamazoo, MI at the age of 20, I grew alongside youth and young adults living on the streets and pursing safe and stable housing. The common theme, trauma and lack of access to therapy. These brilliant but often lost youth’s stories motivated me to continue, as I began working with children and families displaced from Mexico and other countries, providing emotional health advocacy to those living in San Diego, CA. I continued my shock, providing direct therapy to children living in long term group homes, between the ages of 4 to 18, all determined “unadoptable.” AND why? Their trauma experiences impacted their behaviors, learning and relationships. Together, we quickly saw growth through play. Growth in the capacity to regulate feelings, body awareness and the power to heal when there was access. Access continued to be the only pattern linking youth and families to an emotionally healthy, regulated and safe re-start to life. But where would these youth go? Where next? I was thrilled to be Co-Lead for the first THP+ program, housing for youth transitioning out of long term foster care, into stable and independent housing. The foundation for success, access to programing, therapy and natural supports. It wasn’t long, that I transitioned my life to Olympia, WA in support of my husband’s mental health and medical care, following his injuries in Afghanistan. As he fought for his life, and later was supported in learning to swallow, walk, talk and rebuild himself, I once again saw a pattern, access invited healing. Without access to twenty four hour mental health supports, the trauma, the needs and the ongoing memories would have been to much to bear, but mental health supports allowed for a fresh start, allowed for healing. During our time in Olympia, I began to observe displaced youth on our streets. Youth living under bridges, in boxes, in alleys and experiencing lack of respect, food and safety in our little city. I immediately founded and mobilized Olympia Stand Up for Kids Chapter, a 100% based volunteer team that devoted 2 to 3 days and evenings to working alongside the youth, teens and young adults in our city that lacked housing and security. I began to provide mental health support in their spaces, under bridges, boxes where teens were calling home. Local diners, churches and other spaces that grew in our mission often created space to support healing. Our team grew to over 20 volunteers, and with time we rose to create a drop-in center for the youth and young adults we were walking alongside. Creating safe spaces to play, sleep, eat and become resourced to ensure access to all basic needs, including mental health. Coffee shops opened their doors to support coffee as a stimulant to those who didn’t have access to medication to support their diagnosis of ADHD, stores opened their doors to support clothing for interviews and funders opened their pocketbooks to allow ongoing access. We created a free space graffiti wall to encourage art & community, a space for board games to create ongoing growth of problem solving, communication and attachment, and created spaces for music to invite expression and increase self-esteem. Together we saw youth become employed in a community that once deemed them a problem. We saw youth re-enter school, housing opportunities arose and the local safety teams such as EMT, Fire Department and Police Department began to offer support, love, and grace to these same youth they had once been working alongside only when a call was made to 911. Together, we created a full community event, where access to education, and awareness to the causes and impacts of youth homelessness created footprints for understanding, compassion and ongoing access to supports. Later, I found myself in Grand Rapids, MI. The ongoing impacts of my career fueled my passion to continue ensuring access. My husband and I became licensed foster parents, opening our home to children in our community, with a commitment to ensure each child had access to safety, security, access to therapy and unconditional love. BUT I wasn’t done… As it became clear, access to mental health and emotional health supports required advocacy at all levels within my new community. I immediately became part of a local team offering grief and cancer support, a program model that found value in offering free support to people on a grief or cancer journey. I invested my passion, energy and learning into healing on a grief and chronic illness journey through play. Once again, play continued to remain the answer. I partnered with a local university to create a youth and traumatic grief curriculum, and committed every day to leading therapeutic play-based groups for children, their families, schools, and workshops in support of teaching the foundations of play on a healing journey. During my time with this incredible team, I supported the growth of youth grief and youth cancer programing. As traumatic grief and PTSD became a merging mental health diagnosis and need, I began to witness a mental health crisis in our community. Children were experiencing a higher rate of abuse, neglect, and an increase in mental health diagnosis. I joined a Behavior Home Health team and began providing crisis mental health support to children and their families. The BHH program has seen the barriers in access and provided therapy in the spaces where children already were. Therapy in schools, therapy in drop in spaces, and therapy in the communities these children and families already had access to. The results, weekly engagement, weekly participation, and the ability to grow natural community through school and program partnerships. Through therapeutic play and access, children began to grow. My next step was evident, becoming a Registered Play Therapist, and becoming a beacon for change in the therapeutic play community. As I continued to work alongside children and families in the world of crisis, I continued to meet with leaders in our community, sharing the patterns of play and access. It wasn’t long before our community began to request support, programming and learning among these topics, yet the need continued. Through ongoing advocacy, a strong group of volunteer advocates and a refusal to pause, THE PLAYGROUNDgr was founded. Due to lack of access to both play therapy and Registered Play Therapists ™ we grew. I am proud to share, THE PLAYGROUNDgr is the first non-profit in the USA offering free play therapy support, workshops and trainings INSIDE our community, for people of all ages. We decreased the barriers of access by ensuring all programming is accessible on the bus line, walkable for downtown neighbors, free and is led by trained Registered Play Therapists ™ who are passionate and committed to mental health, inclusion, and healing for all. THE PLAYGROUNDgr is able to provide therapeutic play to over 200 youth a week, countless families, young adults AND provide trainings to teacher, clinicians, and other advocates looking to add play therapy strategies to their own work and world. We will continue this work, until there is no longer a gap between play therapy and access. We will continue to create free events that normalize therapy, mental health, and emotional wellness, create workshops to support families, youth placed in foster care and children living in homes where foster placements occur. Through our work, I have had the honor of growing my role from 100% volunteer to part time staff. We are proud to have been honored as the Fall Non-Profit of the Year by 100 Business Who Care in 2022, and as the Top 3 in the Reader’s Choice Award for Mental Health Services in West Michigan Woman’s Magazine in 2023. The research is clear, access to play therapy is the missing link to healing and I am committed to ensuring there are ongoing touch points and access to every nonprofit in our community, school, family, and children who would benefit from Play Therapy. I am proud to share, my family remains active in the Foster Care community, as we have been a Foster Placement Family for over twelve years. Our family has grown, and we have since adopted two children who were placed in our home, grew a child who was born to our family and continue to be advocates in creating change and support in access to mental health through community Boards, volunteer roles and ongoing work to ensure play therapy continues to have a seat the table. I am invested in ensuring play and therapeutic access is available to my family, their friends, their schools, and the community they live in. I am committed to bridging the gap, as I believe, with my who heart, that play and play therapy are one of the top missing links to emotional wellness and mental health in our city.

I am excited to share, that my advocacy has landed upon new ears. I was recently nominated and accepted the role of Vice President of the Michigan Association of Play Therapy Board of Directors, an opportunity to continue to share the importance accessible play therapy and inclusion in play therapy, at a state level.

I was recently nominated for the Social Change Agent Award through West Michigan Woman’s Magazine, where one of three finalists will be chosen and honored on May 9. The table of amazing women is strong, and it is a true honor to be considered alongside them.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Grand Rapids is the best little big city in the Midwest! Within a cross walk you can experience the greatest wines, entertainment and live music around! I love new experiences, and am always ready to cram a weekend of fun into one day and an overnight, and I would start in my own neighborhood, with a lavender latte from Lyon Street Cafe, and a few grape leaves from the deli at Martha’s Vineyard. We’d hop on an electric scooter and head right downtown. My first stop would be a glass of champagne at Reserve Wine and Food, and then I would check into The Amway Grand Hotel, for a night on the town. I would stop at the Jdek at Margaux , right on the Grand River. for their French onion soup, Caesar salad with extra, extra anchovies and their legendary seafood tour. After a quick game of Duck Pin bowling at Woodrows Duckpin Bowling, I would get all dolled up in our room at the Amway Grand Hotel, and head over to Broadway Grand Rapids for a show!!!!! I’d end the night, with a cup of coffee and dessert at Mertens Prime, enjoying their table side creation of bananas foster and their big ole cheese cart. If there was time, we would slip into the hotel’s hot tub, and then spend the rest of our night watching CSI reruns and eating a bag of pickled kettle chips.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Where does one begin? It takes a village, and my entire career is based on those who said yes to my outlandish ideas and dreams. Thank you to a very special board of Directors at THE PLAYGROUNDgr, leadership at Arbor Circle, my mentor Beth Nelson, and my family who sacrificed their wife and Mama on late nights and early mornings, so I can play a small piece in making the world a better place. Lastly, my Mom and Dad, who never stopped encouraging me to make waves in this beautiful world. Doing what is right is possible, when you have a village like mine!

Website: theplaygroundgr.org

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theplaygroundgrandrapids/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacqueline-scherer-lmsw/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PLAYGROUNDGR/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@theplaygroundgr

Image Credits
Robin K Photography Photo & Crowned Creative Studio LLC