Social Work Today E-Zine

Generous donors are poised to give the University of Michigan (U-M) Depression Center $1.5 million to fund advanced research on bipolar disorder, through two challenge grants that are designed to encourage smaller donations by individuals —especially those whose families and friends have been affected by bipolar disorder.

If the challenge is met, U-M scientists and their colleagues will have $3 million to pour into research on a disease that traps 5.7 million Americans on a medical roller coaster of manic highs and depressed lows that can be debilitating or even fatal.

Donations of any size will be dedicated exclusively to further the work of the Heinz C. Prechter Bipolar Research Fund. Prechter was an automotive pioneer who fell victim to suicide in 2001 after battling bipolar disorder on and off for decades, even while building a successful business and attracting the admiration of friends and family.

The two challenge grants come from the World Heritage Foundation-Prechter Family Fund, which has pledged up to $1 million, and the Herrick Foundation, which has pledged up to $500,000.

Every dollar received as part of the challenge will fuel the search for the specific genes that make a person vulnerable to developing bipolar disorder, and that cause the disease to run in some families.

— Source: University of Michigan Health System

A diverse coalition of 13 national organizations has joined in a renewed effort to protect the safety and emotional well-being of students, including those who are at higher risk because of their sexual orientation. The group of education, health, mental health, and religious organizations recently released “Just the Facts About Sexual Orientation and Youth: A Primer for Principals, Educators, and School Personnel.”

The publication serves as a guide for employees who confront sensitive issues involving gay, lesbian, and bisexual students. It is intended to help school administrators foster safe and healthy school environments, in which all students can achieve to the best of their ability. “Just the Facts” includes the most recent information from professional health organizations, as well as up-to-date information on the legal responsibility of school officials to protect students from anti-gay harassment. “Just the Facts” has been mailed to all 16,000 public school superintendents in the United States.

The coalition issued the following joint statement:

“The opportunity for students to learn is diminished when they do not feel safe or supported at school. In addition to assault and harassment, gay, lesbian and bisexual students experience high rates of emotional distress, suicide attempts, and substance abuse. These factors hinder their emotional and social development, as well as their ability to succeed in school. It is our responsibility to provide accurate and factual information. We believe this publication will be a valuable tool to help educators, administrators and others concerned with caring for America’s students.”

— Source: National Association of Social Workers

Green Chimneys has been named the recipient of National Network for Youth’s 2008 Agency of the Year Award in recognition of the vital role the organization plays in the healthy development of youth, families, and communities. Founded in 1947, Green Chimneys serves more than 3,500 children, teens, and families annually through a wide assortment of programs.

“Through its innovative programming, Green Chimneys gives hundreds of children and their families the tools that enable them to regain a sense of self-worth, positively experience and reclaim their youth, and plan for the future as independent, positive, and productive adults,” says Victoria Wagner, president and CEO of National Network for Youth.

There are 2.5 million disconnected, unaccompanied, and/or homeless youth in the United States. Since the awarding of its first federal Runaway and Homeless Youth grant in 2000, Green Chimneys has worked tirelessly on behalf of homeless and runaway gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and questioning youth (LGBTQ). As one of the first mainstream agencies to acknowledge a need for LGBTQ specific programming, Green Chimneys has provided foster care and homeless youths programs for LGBTQ and allies for the last 20 years.

“Green Chimneys is the oldest homeless youth housing program specifically for LGBTQ youths in NYC,” says James Bolas of Empire State Coalition of Youth and Family Services. “This program has always taken an inclusive approach to services, even to the extent that they would not restrict their housing services to only LGBT identified youth only, but opened their services to homeless youth who were allies as well, and create a supportive community environment,”

— Source: Green Chimneys

The Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) has been awarded a renewal grant of more than $4.7 million from the John A. Hartford Foundation to fund its Gero-Ed Center operations for the next five years. Beginning on July 1, 2007, and ending on June 30, 2012, the grant will fund various programming to better integrate materials about working with older adults into social work curricula. The overarching goal of all Center programs is to enhance the well-being of older adults and their families through the care that social work practitioners provide.

“We are at a critical crossroads with older adults as the nation’s fastest growing population,” says Nancy Hooyman, coPrincipal Investigator of the Gero-Ed Center and Hooyman Gerontology professor at the University of Washington, Seattle. “Without this grant, new generations of social workers would not be as prepared to improve the quality of life for our grandparents, elder neighbors, and millions of older Americans.”

“CSWE is extremely grateful to the Hartford Foundation for promoting the social work gerontological movement to be taken to the next level,” says Julia Watkins, executive director of CSWE. “The social work education profession is in an ideal position to make a lasting impact on the care that older adults receive, and CSWE will work tirelessly to optimize this opportunity.”

With the Hartford grant, the CSWE Gero-Ed Center will approach infusing gerontological material into social work curricula from many angles. The Gero-Ed Center will strive to increase gerontological social work student recruitment and leadership development, educational policy and advocacy, and infuse gerontological competencies into curricula for all institutions offering accredited BSW and MSW programs.

Creating future leaders in the field of gerontological social work is a key objective of these goals. The CSWE Gero-Ed Center will give BSW students hands-on learning opportunities through one-on-one experiences with older adults. Admissions staff and faculty advisors at universities will also be supplied with ample social work career and curricular resources. Additionally, the CSWE Gero-Ed Center will provide social work graduates and current doctoral students with syllabi and other resources designed to help them succeed in their profession.

— Source: The Council on Social Work Education

The Citizens Budget Commission (CBC) has awarded the ACCESS NYC online tool with its 2007 Prize for Public Service Innovation. The prize, which was presented to the New York City Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications and the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services for New York City, recognizes successful innovations in the delivery of public services.

Accenture developed ACCESS NYC to provide some of New York’s neediest citizens with a single point, user-friendly system, in seven different languages, to access multiple human services agencies. The integrated system is the first web-based, cross-agency integrated screening tool for the City of New York.

One of the most respected good government groups, the CBC annually awards its public innovation prize to recognize creative thinking and innovative approaches to providing government services. It is available in seven different languages to help NYC residents determine what benefits are available, which ones they might be eligible for, provides prepopulated applications, and gives instructions on how to apply for each of the individual programs. Launched in September 2006, the site (www.nyc.gov/accessnyc) has already served more than 88,000 New Yorkers, with more than 14,000 engaging in the electronic application process.

— Source: Citizens Budget Commission

Doctors Kay Redfield Jamison, Frederick Goodwin, Ned Kalin among honorees at consumer organization’s annual scientific advisory board luncheon.

The Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA), the nation’s largest patient-run organization focusing on the most prevalent mental illnesses, honored five top researchers and clinicians. The awardees were selected by DBSA’s Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) Executive Committee in consultation with DBSA constituents. Consumers and family members participated via an online vote that overviewed the work of each nominated researcher and allowed consumers and their families to vote for the researchers they believed had the greatest impact of their health and wellness. DBSA’s SAB comprises some of the leading researchers and clinicians in the nation focusing on mood disorders.

This year’s event also marked the presentation of a new honor with the introduction of the DBSA Hope Award, now the highest honor the organization can bestow. The award was established to recognize the lifelong contributions of individuals who have helped improve the lives of people living with mood disorders. In addition to the Hope Award, DBSA chose senior and young investigators as recipients of the Gerald L. Klerman Award, given annually in appreciation of lifetime contributions to understanding the causes, diagnosis and treatment of depressive and bipolar illnesses.

The first-ever recipients of the DBSA Hope Awards were Frederick Goodwin, PhD, psychiatry professor at George Washington University Medical Center and former director the National Institute of Mental Health; and renowned author and researcher Kay Redfield Jamison, PhD.

Ned Kalin, PhD, Hedberg Professor and Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin Medical School accepted the 2006 Gerald L. Klerman Senior Investigator Award.

Martha Sajatovic, PhD, and Helen Verdeli, PhD, were honored as corecipients of the 2006 Gerald L. Klerman Young Investigator Award. Sajatovic is a professor of psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio; and Verdeli is a member of the Mental Health Advisory Committee for the Millennium Villages Project of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, in addition to being a newly impaneled member of DBSA’s SAB.

“Partnership between consumers, clinicians and the research community are so important to ensuring we have the most effective treatments and ultimately find a cure for these devastating illnesses,” said Sue Bergeson, DBSA’s president, who presented the awards. “Each and every one of these honorees qualifies as a patient-celebrated clinician.”

— Source: Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance

The California Social Welfare Archives held its annual induction ceremony for the California Social Work Hall of Distinction admitting six illustrious social workers, including three posthumously. Cosponsored by the USC School of Social Work and the National Association of Social Workers, the Hall of Distinction inducted Diana Ming Chan, coordinator of the Asian Pacific Islander Social Work Council; Lillian Hyatt, a leader in self-empowerment; Marianne Pennekamp, a prolific children and family social work contributor; Simon Dominguez (deceased), a champion of Latino social workers in California; Richard Ford (deceased), former dean of the California State University Fresno School of Social Work; and John Wax (deceased), a pioneering healthcare social worker.

Diana Ming Chan
Diana Ming Chan is a former school social worker, who, over the course of her career, has been a policy advocate, social work mentor, instructor, director, clinical practitioner, consultant, and staff trainer. When budget cuts resulted in many eliminated school social work jobs in 2000, she and her family committed $1 million to establish the Learning Springboard Endowment in the National Association of Social Workers Foundation. Chan's dedication to social work has opened doors that were once closed for many school social workers. She has reached out to immigrants and their American-born children while working to integrate teacher interaction with social workers. Chan pioneered culturally relevant applications of social work principles to the San Francisco Bay-area Asian population and advanced the knowledge of Chinese-American culture in the school district.

Lillian Hyatt
Lillian Hyatt has followed a personal path in the profession. Before she became a social worker, Hyatt traveled the world promoting religious dialogue and tolerance as the wife and aide to the president of the National Conference of Christians and Jews and the International Council of Christians and Jews. She has also taught and conducted research at San Francisco State University, and she founded the Coalition for Interfaith Understanding. Since 2005, Hyatt has been writing articles for the California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform to offer a consumer perspective—she is a resident of a California Continuing Care Retirement Community—and has consequently become an elder care advocate for herself and other residents.

Marianne Pennekamp
Marianne Pennekamp’s contribution to social work spans 50 years. She has influenced the development of the profession through practice, teaching, and writing, helping to change social work’s focus from casework to a person-in-the-environment perspective that encourages collaboration with other professionals and organizations. Since retiring in the mid-1980s, Pennekamp has helped to develop a workshop for children of divorce and has served on the Child Death Review Committee, which resulted in publishing recommendations that addressed the documented, preventable child deaths and reduced the high rates of child deaths in Humboldt County.

Simon Dominguez
With passion and conviction, Simon Dominguez was instrumental in developing, organizing and advocating for services and programs to better serve the Chicano/Latino population in California. His contributions to social work included the advancement of education for Latino social workers, exemplified by his role in the creation of the School of Social Work at San Jose State University, where he served as a role model and mentor for social work students, faculty, and members of the community for 33 years. In the early 1970s, Dominguez initiated the Chicano Mental Health committee in Santa Clara County, and in his later years, he had begun writing about the history of Latino social workers in the state.

Richard Ford
Richard Ford was also instrumental in the development of a social work school. As dean of the California State University Fresno School of Social Work for 24 years, Ford provided significant leadership to a young, fledgling social work program, recruiting and maintaining the most diverse faculty and student body on the CSU Fresno campus. During his tenure, thousands of minority and disadvantaged students completed their degrees in social work. His influence had a significant impact on social work in the central San Joaquin Valley.

John Wax
For 50 years, John Wax served as a devoted staff member of the Veterans Administration, pioneering social work education in group and organizational techniques. He was social work supervisor for the Denver VA Hospital from 1947 to 1957 and chief of social work service at the Palo Alto California Medical Center from 1957 to 1997. Wax focused on assisting social workers to develop their power to implant and realize social work values in the healthcare system. He spearheaded use of the concept of the victim mentality and how it inhibited the development of effective social work practice in the hospital setting. Wax’s influence helped social workers to achieve positive change in their professional and organizational lives.

— Source: USC School of Social Work