Social Work Commons^™

Book Review: Ecologies Of Inequity. How Disaster Response Reconstitutes Race And Class Inequality, Abel Traslaviña-Arias

Critical Disaster Studies

In Ecologies of Inequity: How Disaster Response Reconstitutes Race and Class Inequality, Sancha Doxilly Medwinter gathered diverse stories about how various migrant communities had to overcome not only disaster but also the overlapping networks established by those who were supposed to support them in 2012 in New York City. Medwinter portrays this contested post-disaster landscape through a thorough data recording of 120 individuals affiliated with various groups: racialized migrants or locals, tenants or property owners, local or external helpers, and those from wealthy or impoverished backgrounds. Ecologies of Inequity refer to the spatialized networks of organizational and interpersonal relations …

Suicide Among Youth And Young Adults In Canada: Bereaved Parents’ Perspectives On The Systems Of Care, Toula Kourgiantakis, Deborah Cooper, David Cooper, Shelley Craig, Eunjung Lee, Jori Jones, Carrie K.Y. Lau, Romy Naïma Tousignant, Jonathan B. Singer, Marjorie Johnstone, Juveria Zaheer

Social Work: School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Other Works

Background: Suicide is the second leading cause of death among youth and young adults aged 15–24 in Canada. Emergency departments often serve as the first point of contact for identifying suicide risk, particularly for youth and young adults, partly due to the inaccessibility and unavailability of community mental health services. Almost half of the youth who die by suicide visit an emergency department in the year preceding their death, and up to 90% have untreated mental health and substance use concerns. Studies have found that parents describe youth mental health services as harmful, fragmented, inaccessible, and inadequate in meeting their …

Prostitution In Video Games: Stigma, Violence And Male Pleasure, Laura Aguilera-Ávila, Lara Escobar Hernández

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Prostitution has traditionally been framed in society as a space significantly determined by patriarchal hierarchies, in addition to being affected on many occasions by stigmatisation and violence. The representation of prostitution and of those who practice it in the media is a topic of special interest, since the discourses and messages disseminated by the media play a fundamental role in socialisation. Video games are not exempt from this debate: with millions of players worldwide and a special reach among young people, they are among the most influential media outlets today. This qualitative research analyses a series of titles, both AAA …

Evidence Based Project: Japanese Immigrant Elderly Couples In The Midwest, Isabel Anderson

Student Projects

This paper examined the unique needs and challenges of Japanese immigrant elderly couples living in the rural Midwest of the United States through the lens of systemic family therapy. The focus family consisted of an elderly husband showing early signs of dementia and a wife who recognized the necessity of transitioning to independent living. Their adult daughter and son-in-law’s involvement intensified intergenerational tension, as traditional cultural norms granted the husband decision-making authority. The study provided a statistical overview of Japanese immigrant families in the U.S., highlighting aging trends, linguistic barriers, and geographic dispersion. Common psychosocial and systemic issues such as …

Teaching Note - Embedding The Human Library Experience Within Social Work Curriculum, Emily M. Paine

Social Work Faculty Works

The Human Library is a global initiative designed to challenge stereotypes and foster dialogue through storytelling and presents a unique opportunity for experiential learning within social work education. This teaching note explores how the Human Library framework can be integrated into social work curriculum in alignment with the 2022 Council on Social Work Education’s Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards, with particular emphasis on Competency 3: Engaging in Anti-Racism, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion practice. When embedded in coursework, the Human Library enables students to engage in brave and authentic conversations with storytellers who share aspects of their lived experiences, promoting mutuality, …

Social Work In Times Of Genocide: A Palestinian Feminist Praxis Of Social Work, Stephanie Wahab

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

The abstract is translated in Arabic below. Social work cannot meaningfully claim a commitment to justice, human dignity, and the worth of people while simultaneously remaining committed to colonial logics. Recognizing and resisting collusion with settler colonialism demands structural shifts in knowledge production, curriculum, practice, and institutional alignment. This article speaks to organized social work’s collusion with the zionist project of Palestinian erasure amid the ongoing Nakba and genocide. Since Palestinian social workers are living and surviving genocide as they practice social work, worn binaries, such as provider–client, are unsettled in ways that make a Palestinian feminist praxis of social …

Youth Program Fy2025 Evaluation Report, Madhawa Palihapitiya, Karina Zeferino

Massachusetts Office of Public Collaboration Publications

A School Climate Needs Assessment completed by 57 administrators evaluated both overall school climate and the key components that contribute to it. Administrators revealed low satisfaction with overall school climate (25%) and with students’ SEL skills (19%), and most considered these areas important to improve (77% and 79%) and expressed a desire for support (60% and 53%). Similar patterns emerged for academic performance (28% satisfied; 86% considered improvement important; 44% desired support), disciplinary actions (19%; 54%; 49%), and conflict levels—student-student (21%; 79%; 60%) and student-teacher (26%; 49%; 47%). Across these domains, a substantial proportion of respondents—often …

Redesigning The Front Office Procedures Binder For Future Staff Success, Tara Q. Dunleavy

Institute for Disability Studies

No abstract provided.

Undergraduate Awareness Of Sexual Harassment Law In Tanzania's Higher Learning Institutions: Case Studies Of Two Universities, Salma Ramadhan Fundi Phd Candidate

Tanzania Journal of Sociology

This study examines undergraduate students' awareness of legal provisions and guidelines concerning sexual harassment in Tanzanian higher education, focusing on the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM) and the Open University of Tanzania (OUT) as case studies. Sexual harassment significantly impacts students’ well-being, safety, and academic success. Despite the existence of legal frameworks, students' knowledge of these provisions is often limited. The study employed a qualitative approach with a phenomenological research design to explore students’ experiences and perceptions of harassment policies. This design allowed participants to share the meanings they attach to their experiences and how such policies are understood …

Violence As An Ecology: Women Making Safety In Khayelitsha, Melissa J. Miller-Felton

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation asks how women in Khayelitsha make safety in a place where danger has become ordinary and where the afterlives of colonialism and apartheid still determine who waits, who walks, and who arrives home. What began as a study of risk and protection grew into an inquiry about time, dignity, and responsibility. I call the framework that emerged an ecology of violence—a way of seeing how harm gathers across generations and infrastructures, and how care, exhaustion, and survival intertwine within it.

In this ecology, violence is not a single act but a confluence of registers—slow, structural, colonial, and …

Digital Literacy And Family Engagement For Student Success, Genesis B. Mendoza

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The North Monterey County Unified School District (NMCUSD) in Castroville, California, serves a student population in which 87.5% are identified as low-income and nearly half are designated as English Language Learners. Families face significant barriers to accessing educational and community resources, barriers worsened by limited digital literacy and technology access. The NMCUSD Castro Plaza Family Resource Center serves as a vital hub supporting families in the predominantly rural and socioeconomically disadvantaged region. This project aimed to strengthen family engagement and digital inclusion through hands-on workshops. Workshop topics included online student registration and data verification, training on essential district digital tools …

Understanding Mental Health Crisis Response Through The Lens Of First Responders, Ella Gibson

Student Theses

Responses to mental health crises are becoming an increasingly contentious topic as cases of extreme police violence or fatality during a crisis are publicized in the media. Although first responders’ experiences with mental health crisis response have been explored in prior literature, there remains a lack of research that gathers data from multiple first responder roles and compares their experiences across groups. There is also a significant gap in research examining the perspectives of co-response teams. This study sought to gather qualitative data on the experiences of police officers, EMTs/paramedics, and co-response team members, and to explore their perceptions of …

"I Wished I Could Have Said Bye": Exploring Youth Reactions To Formal Mentoring Relationship Endings, Thomas E. Keller, Martha J. Mccormack, Miriam Miranda-Diaz, Alison L. Drew, Renee Spencer

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Youth mentoring programs strive to create stable, supportive relationships between adult mentors and youth mentees to promote positive youth development. Although these formal relationships always reach a conclusion, little is known about how mentees experience the endings of their relationships. This study elicits the words and perspectives of mentees to investigate the emotional reactions provoked by mentoring relationship terminations. Participants were youth (n = 72) in a prospective study of mentoring relationship development who completed a survey following the official closure of their match. Asked how they felt about the match ending, mentees more often indicated negative rather than positive …

"Oxygen Is Not For The Dead": Critical And Radical Social Work In Palestine, Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Stephanie Wahab, Abeer Musleh

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Palestinian poet and novelist Hiba Abu Nada, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on October 20, 2023, at the age of 32, taught us that “Oxygen is not for the dead.” Hiba Abu Nada’s (2017) poem, entitled “Our Loneliness,”1 recognizes survivance (Vizenor, 2010)—that is, the active sense of presence and presencing as an endeavor of creating the future (Simpson, 2017)—and asserts Palestinian embodied connections (Shalhoub-Kevorkian, 2024) to land/life (Khoury, 2019 [2016]):

Financial Well-Being Among Self-Employed Older Americans, Cal J. Halvorsen, Byeongju Ryu

Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging

As people live longer, there has been growing attention in recent years on extending working lives. Although many older adults fully retire, those who continue to work often turn to self-employment—a broad category that includes entrepreneurs, small business owners, consultants, contractors, gig workers, and people who take on side jobs. Rates of self-employment rise sharply with age, with nearly 30 percent of employed adults in their 70s working for themselves—approximately twice the share of those in their 60s.

Preventing, Delaying, And Managing Chronic Disease, Michele Dinman, Logan Fox

Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging

We are living longer. Today, men and women who reach age 65 will live another 17 to 20 years, on average. As the human body ages, normal biological changes increase vulnerability to illness, and the risk of developing disease increases. At the same time, advances in public health, medicine, and health care have reduced deaths from acute conditions, like infection and accidents, and have increased our chances of living longer into the human life span. Thus, we now have greater chances of developing one or more chronic diseases. Most (75%) adults in the U.S. live with at least one chronic …

Being A Caregiver For A Friend Or Family Member, Nancy Morrow-Howell, Michele Dinman

Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging

Informal caregivers give assistance to family and friends who have functional limitations that challenge self-care. Most often, caregivers assist younger adults living with a disability and older people with age- associated chronic conditions. Family caregivers are the backbone of our long-term care system in this country, delivering 80% of care. Caregiving is increasing as people live longer with more chronic conditions. Indeed, caregiving is the new norm in our older society. As Roselyn Carter said: "There are only four kinds of people in the world. Those who have been caregivers, those who are currently caregivers, those who will be caregivers, …

Lifelong Civic Engagement, Logan Fox, Emma Ward, Cal J. Halvorsen

Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging

Civic engagement can be broadly defined as the practice of service (volunteering or informal helping), advocacy, and political participation (voting). Older adults are a large and growing population that frequently engages in these civic activities.

In 2022, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that approximately one quarter of the 11 million daily volunteers in the U.S. were age 65 and older. Between 2018 and 2021, there was a 10% increase in volunteer hours filled by individuals over age 65. Research shows this trend will be mutually beneficial, improving the quality of life for older adults who are, in turn, positively …

Climate Change And Population Aging, Anastasia Rhule, Michele Dinman, Natalie Galucia

Harvey A. Friedman Center for Aging

Glaciers are shrinking, river and lake ice is melting earlier, plant and animal habitat ranges are changing, and trees and flowers are blooming earlier. Additionally, longer and more severe heat waves are occurring. Droughts, wildfires, and extreme rainfall are happening at a faster rate than previously predicted by scientists.

Housing Programs And Resources Available For Transitional Age Youth Population: A Scoping Review, Amanda N. Esquivel

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Transitional Age Youth (TAY), are defined as individuals aged 16 to 24 transitioning from adolescence to adulthood. TAY face unique challenges in securing stable housing and developing the life skills necessary for independent living. This population often encounters significant barriers such as a lack of affordable housing, limited access to supportive services, and the residual effects of childhood trauma, systemic inequities, or time spent in foster care or juvenile justice systems. Without adequate support, TAY are at a heightened risk of homelessness, unemployment, poor mental health outcomes, and continued cycles of instability. This research paper explores and identifies effective housing …

Risk And Protective Factors For Suicidal Thoughts And Behaviors For Black Adolescent Males With Exposure To Adverse Experiences Post-Covid 19 Pandemic: Findings From The 2023 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey., Amanda Minogue

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Suicide is the second leading cause of death among adolescents aged 10-24 in the United States. In 2022, 784 Black adolescent males died by suicide. Recent studies have found that traditionally common associations of risk factors of suicidal thoughts and behaviors are not experienced by Black adolescents, challenging how to determine and detect risk. This dissertation reviewed the variables in the national Youth Risk Behavior Survey that closely align with risk and protective factors of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, and the interaction between these and adverse experiences in Black adolescent males. Results of this study found that among the 9 …

A Decade Of Knowledge Without Borders: Open Access And Global Reach Of School Social Work Research, Leticia Villarreal Sosa

School of Social Work Faculty Publications

As we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the International Journal for School Social Work (IJSSW), this article provides a reflection on a decade the last decade of breaking barriers and building bridges across practitioners, researchers, communities, and continents and looks forward to our responsibility for the future. This article discusses the benefits and challenges related to Open Access publishing, and addresses how Open Access is a public good—ensuring that practitioners, researchers, students, and policymakers can engage the best evidence regardless of geography, resources, or institutional affiliation. The impact of IJSSW is reviewed, including a summary of accomplishments, most downloaded …

Engage, Assess, Intervene, Evaluate: Barriers Facing The Elderly Population, Isabel Anderson, Gracie Brown, Mari Langton

Student Projects

This study examined barriers faced by older adults in Orange City, Iowa, through a mixed-methods community practice project incorporating assessment, implementation, and evaluation. During the assessment phase, researchers conducted interviews with elderly residents and professionals, gathered observational data, and facilitated community dialogue using the Nominal Group Technique. Key themes included social isolation, transportation challenges, financial strain, limited health literacy, and difficulty transitioning from independence to assisted living. A strong cultural emphasis on independence often discouraged help-seeking, while fragmented agency communication and rural limitations in specialized care further complicated service navigation. Asset mapping and power analysis highlighted community cohesion, faith-based support, …

Participatory Development Of A Suicide Prevention Program For Autism Community Organizations., A V. Kirby, K Feldman, B Duncan-Ishcomer, R Kripke-Ludwig, A Joyce, W Lee, K Rodriguez, Z Siddeek, A Darlington, A Atisme, W Clark, K Murthi, L Wexler, C Nicolaidis

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Participatory research is critical for developing appropriate and effective programs for specific communities. Suicide is a health inequity for autistic people and prevention is a high priority for autistic community members. Using community-based participatory research with autistic partners, we aimed to develop a research-informed, conceptually grounded, and community-supported suicide prevention program for the autism community. The participatory, multistep program development process included regular meetings to integrate existing research with an established intervention framework and was informed by 38 qualitative research interviews with autistic adults, family members, and mental health providers. The development process resulted in a four-part, virtual, education and …

Taking Small Steps With Big Data: Exploring The Impact Of Education On Social Mobility, Yung Chun, Jenrose Fitzgerald, Jason Jabbari

Center for Social Development Research

Historically, education and workforce-development programs have relied on survey data or state-government administrative data to examine program impacts. However, surveys are costly, reasonable comparison groups can be difficult to identify, and results from analyses of a single state’s administrative data can seldom be generalized to enable broader conclusions. This brief discusses a research collaboration between the Center for Social Development, the National Student Clearinghouse, and a large credit bureau. Through this collaboration researchers used large, frequently updated, multi-type (i.e., “big”) data to examine the impact of education and certificate programs on social mobility, as well as racial and gender equity. …

Data For Social Impact - Data Persona Worksheet, Jenrose Fitzgerald, Dan Ferris, Amelia Parnell

Center for Social Development Research

Developed in collaboration with Amelia Parnell and drawing upon the framework from Parnell's 2021 book You Are a Data Person: Strategies for Using Analytics on Campus, this worksheet facilitates exploration of data identity and the identification of data personas.

Book Review: Resisting The Dehumanization Of Refugees, Staci Martin

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Resisting the Dehumanization of Refugees, edited by Abu-Laban, Frishkopf, Hasmath, and Kirova, has a familiar quality when I read it. The book explores the profound struggle to cocreate a sense of home and belonging amidst the relentless dehumanization refugees face from restrictive policies, biased media portrayals, and societal prejudice. It adopts a transdisciplinary approach, featuring contributions from scholars, practitioners, and refugees themselves, who focus on the Canadian context and draw on broader international comparisons that support both the mechanisms of dehumanization and strategies for resistance.

Burnout And Perceived Organizational Support Among Female Healthcare Social Workers, Shukundala Clark Champion

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Healthcare social workers experience elevated levels of burnout, or psychological distress resulting from a prolonged mismatch between the individual and their work environment. The problem addressed in this generic qualitative study is that female healthcare social workers experience elevated rates of burnout but may not receive adequate perceived organizational support (POS) to help ameliorate burnout. This study concentrated on female healthcare social workers' descriptions and experiences of burnout and POS. The guiding theoretical framework for this study is the perceived organizational support theory (POST). The study was conducted with 14 female healthcare social workers working in various healthcare settings in …

Hospice Clinical Social Workers’ Perceptions On Reducing Burnout Through Empowerment And Self-Care Practices, Chasity Johnson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Burnout is common among hospice clinical social workers due to the emotionally demanding nature of the profession and heavy caseloads. This study explored how hospice clinical social workers perceive the role of empowerment and self-care practices in reducing burnout. The qualitative design used semi-structured interviews with ten hospice clinical social workers. Thematic analysis identified five categories: indicators of burnout, team-based/relational support, systemic and workload pressures, organizational culture, and values and professional identity. The themes that emerged from the five categories were emotional, physical, and professional; interdisciplinary support and supervisory support; workload and organizational demands; organizational challenges and policy limitations; workplace …

Our Teens Are Not Okay, But They Can Be: An Application Of The Family Firo Method To Improve Parent-Adolescent Communication About Suicide, Janene Pack Lpc, Cmhc, Peder Schillemat

Issues in Religion and Psychotherapy

This article explores the critical role of parent-teen communication in the mental well-being of teenagers, with a particular focus on its connection to suicide risk. A particular focus is on teens who live in Utah as the suicide rate for Utah teens and young adults is almost twice the national average. Despite the focus on families and religion in Utah, a significant number of teens continue to struggle with loneliness, hopelessness, and even thoughts of suicide. One key contributing factor to this struggle is the lack of open, supportive communication between Utah teens and their parents. The absence of effective …