Editor’s Note: What Can I Say?
By Marianne Mallon
Social Work Today
Vol. 20 No. 3 P. 4

The most recent Social Work Today issue, March-April, was in process in late February, early March, only two months ago. That was before the world changed forever. The cover story, “The Resource of Resilience,” discussed the need for and nature of resilience. It focused on Florida State University’s Resilience Project, designed to help social work students recognize their innate resilience and develop it further as a professional tool that would serve them well in a social work career that would inevitably involve some major challenges.

Little did I know that before the next issue came around, resilience would be just about the most important gift anyone could have in the new world of a global pandemic. When the time came to write an Editor’s Note, I wondered what I could say that hadn’t already been said. Devastation, heartbreak, unprecedented heroic efforts—you have already seen and read media coverage of some of the saddest stories of loss and happiest stories of resilience you may ever hear by the time you read this note.

Scholars have decades to analyze what happened, and why and how it happened. The task at hand now is saving lives, literally and figuratively—saving physical lives from this insidious virus and helping people to resurrect their emotional, financial, and professional lives decimated in a matter of weeks. And that is where social workers are needed. Always have been, always will be.

Many of the articles in this issue were in various states of completion by late February/early March. At the time, the terms COVID-19 and Coronavirus were not yet part of our daily lexicon as the number of cases were barely front page news and the White House was doing its best to conceal what was being conveyed to them by scientists and top advisors as a serious threat to the wellbeing of the nation and the world. So, I asked most of the writers to reach back to their sources to get comments on how the pandemic would affect the individuals and communities discussed in the articles.

As we move ahead, Social Work Today will continue to cover the crisis and how it is affecting social workers and the work they do. To social workers and all health care professionals, we express our deep gratitude for your sacrifices and continuing efforts to see us through to the other side of this, whatever that may be.

I welcome your feedback and invite you to share your experiences of this time in your professional lives with us.

SWTeditor@gvpub.com