The largest program within UC Davis University Extension receives only brief mention in the continuing-education course catalog, belying its extensive sweep. Potentially touching the lives of millions of Californians, the training program for social services agencies is playing a pivotal role in the state's efforts to put welfare recipients to work. This fiscal year, extension's rapidly growing Center for Human Services Training and Development expects to enroll 50,000 social-service workers in more than 2,500 courses throughout California. Many of the center's courses are customized to meet wide-ranging needs of the state's 58 counties as they reorganize their social-service programs under the new California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids program, or CalWORKS. The 1996 federal overhaul of welfare set lifetime time limits on aid and requires most welfare recipients to work. The reforms also decentralized the welfare system, sending block grants to states to use in welfare programs largely designed by counties. Michael Lawler, center director, said county welfare offices are being asked to dramatically change the way they do business with only the barest of guidelines from state and federal governments. "Welfare reform definitely falls on the shoulder of the line folks," Lawler said. "And there's not a lot in place to help them implement new laws and policies. They turn to us and say, 'Help us.'" Welfare workers who once primarily determined clients' eligibility for aid now have new roles as "client coaches" trying to help welfare recipients become self-sufficient, Lawler said. New job duties include assessing clients' job skills and helping them overcome obstacles that may keep them from becoming employed -- including finding child care, acquiring appropriate work clothes, learning job interview techniques, and dealing with mental illness and substance abuse. Working with counties to retrain their social-service employees -- from the front-line staff to management -- required the human-services training center to quickly retool its courses. The center started 20 years ago with a small federal grant to provide child-welfare training in Northern California counties. Three years later, it expanded its program to offer training for welfare-eligibility workers. In recent years, the program has doubled its revenue to $9 million-nearly as much as all the extension's continuing-education courses in 14 other occupational fields combined. The center's staff has grown by 50 percent to 40 employees. Overflowing its office space on Research Park Drive in south Davis, the center moved last month into larger headquarters across the street on Da Vinci Court. There the offices look like a cubicle rendition of a California map, with employees located by the region of the state they serve. The center's managers spend much of their time in the field. Lawler this week visited five Southern California counties in as many days. "We pay really close attention to what we're hearing, the echoes from the field," he said. Courses are taught around the state, often at county welfare offices, by about 300 contract instructors. Instructors are social-service providers as well as UC Davis faculty members. Offer of custom training While the extension's general catalog alots three of its 112 pages to the human-services program, a specialized catalog available to agencies is a 284-page book. And, as suggested by its title, "Custom Training for Human Services Agency," that catalog is just a starting point. Lawler said about 80 percent of courses are customized to meet differing needs of rural, suburban and metropolitan counties. Tiny Alpine County, for example, receives three days of training. Los Angeles County contracts for 600 days of training. Lawler said the center seeks to treat each county equally. "For some rural counties, this may be the only staff development they get," he said. "They may only have two or three opportunities to grow in a year. If we don't hit it right, then that's a problem." Many courses are born from conversations Lawler and other center managers have with social-service agency administrators about challenges they face. One daylong course is titled "Welcome to TANF Town," named after the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families block grants that replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children. The class puts welfare workers in their clients' position, having them apply for assistance in a simulated welfare office to see how the system can foster, or hinder, self-sufficiency. Other sessions include "Innovation and Creativity in Organizations," "Revitalizing the Human Services Professional," "Changing the Culture of Welfare," "Fostering Community Involvement," "Encouraging Self-Sufficiency," "Client Motivation and Enhancing Life Skills." The center has more than 90 contracts with public and private social service agencies in 58 counties to help them make the transition to CalWORKS. Spreading nationally University Extension Dean Charles Lacy said the program's reputation also is spreading across state borders. Center directors are working with the state of Missouri to expand its training program. "It's never been our goal to have a national program, but it's not going to be something we're going to shy away from either," Lacy said. In addition, the center runs a number of other programs. They include: A child-welfare training program for 34 Northern California counties; Free workshops for child-care providers, funded by the state and created in partnership with the UC Davis Center for Child and Family Studies. Those workshops will also be offered in Spanish beginning this spring; Training for medical, criminal justice and social work professionals in 49 counties who deal with child abuse, domestic violence elder abuse and sexual assault. The program is run in conjunction with the UC Davis Medical Center; Training for mental health departments in 33 counties; A yearly public policy conference at the state Capitol. Past topics have included family violence, affirmative action, drug babies, youth gangs and child abuse; Summer institutes for human services providers held at UC Davis; and * Training and evaluation for Family Violence Demonstration Projects of the state Department of Social Services' Office of Child Abuse Prevention. "My goal is to be a shop that addresses the breadth of human services needs, not just one piece of it," Lawler said.