Therapy Dog Helps Kids Build Reading Skills
Patch.com
Walfish is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker with a graduate degree in social work who worked with adolescents in foster care early in her career, and went on to spend more time as a school social worker and in private psychotherapy practice.

School of Social Work unveils online master’s program
UTA The Shorthorn
The School of Social Work’s master’s program plans to offer a new online addition in the fall that will be more accessible to potential students who may not live within a commutable range, have busy work schedules or simply prefer online education.

Discriminatory laws and policies harm children of LGBT parents, new study finds
San Diego Gay & Lesbian News
The study is the latest in a series of reports co-authored by Movement Advancement Project (MAP), the Family Equality Council and the Center for American Progress, in partnership with the National Association of Social Workers.

Flyer On Gay Choice Stirs Controversy
MyFox Washington DC
Karen Yount-Merrell, a licensed, clinical social worker, got one of the flyers when her son came home with his report card from Einstein High School. “I don’t like it,” Yount-Merrell declared. “Everything in this flyer make its sound like the goal is to be [an] EX-gay, [or an EX]-lesbian. It is not embracing of a different orientation. It reiterates a societal view that there’s something ‘wrong’ with you, if you’re not in the norm.

‘Food Stamp President’ – What’s the Basis of Gingrich’s Claim
Kansas City InfoZine
“In combination with Mr. Gingrich’s remarks that African Americans should prefer jobs to food stamps, Mr. Gingrich’s refrain clearly contains a coded racial message and implies that SNAP benefits flow primarily to person of color in the U.S.,” Michael Reisch, the Daniel Thursz Distinguished Professor of Social Justice at the University of Maryland, said.

Social worker Robert Suchan dons a dress, wig and makeup and becomes Aunt Barbara to sell Tupperware. His comedic sales pitch and costume helped make him the top seller in North America. Photo courtesy of ABC News.

Robert Suchan, a former social worker, puts on makeup, a wig and a dress to become Tupperware saleswoman “Aunt Barbara,” according to this ABC article.

The schtick has worked wondrously — Suchan was the top Tupperware seller in the North America last year, moving $250,000 worth of products. In fact, Suchan, 43, has quit his social worker job to sell Tupperware full time.

“The phone rings every day,” said Suchan, who stands at six feet five inches in heels and bouffant wig. “The emails don’t stop.”

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) testifies in support of same-sex marriage bill at Senate hearing. Photo courtesy of the Washington Blade.

A Jan. 31 Maryland Senate hearing on legislation to grant marital rights to same-sex couples was so full there was an overflow room with television screens, according to this article in the Washington Blade.

In all, 75 people testified in support or opposition to the legislation.

Some of those testifying in favor of the bill, which has the support of Gov. Martin O’Malley (D), was National Association of Social Workers Maryland Chapter Executive Director Daphne McClellan and social workers and radio show hosts Bob and Lori Hollander.

Social workers are committed to equal treatment for all, including LGBT people. To learn more visit the National Association of Social Workers’ Diversity and Equity web site by clicking here.

City Opens First Senior Center Geared To Help People With Vision Loss
NY1
“Our hope is 25 years from now, we will have this center, but blind seniors will be able to go to all the centers in the city because those centers will be universally accessible, regardless of what the disability is,” said VISIONS Executive Director and CEO Nancy Miller.

Talk therapy: 7 ways to help your partner help you
BPMagazine
Bipolar disorder is such a tricky illness: a person can be so well, and then suddenly so “not well.” As a therapist, I assist people with bipolar in making a plan of action—and enlisting a spouse, trusted friend, or relative in co-creating such a plan—for managing things when the going gets tough.

A Young Refugee Searches for a Place in Idaho’s Reshaped Economy
StateImpact Idaho
By Molly Messick Nowela Virginie and her daughters often visit social worker Marcia Munden at Catholic Charities of Idaho. In the last few years, more than four thousand refugees have found their way to Idaho. They’ve come from Africa, and from East and South Asia.  Most came to Boise.

Mesmerized by Metrics: Is Philanthropy Engaging in Magical Thinking?
The Nonprofit Quarterly (blog)
It focused on building up the modern research university, with its emphasis on the physical and social sciences; on the modernization of professions like medicine, public heath, and social work, through the introduction of science into their work and building codes of professional conduct based on it; and on constructing new institutions like think tanks and civic research bureaus, to begin to reshape public policy on the basis of science.

It’s human nature to want a second chance
StandardNet
“I think everybody would love to think they could have a do-over of some part of their life where they’ve made choices that didn’t turn out so well,” says Steve Watson, a licensed clinical social worker in Ogden. But as good as that sounds, Watson says, we also have to remember, “You are who you are largely because of the experiences you’ve gone through” — both good and bad.

When social work is a felony
New York Daily News
Namely, she was thinking of hiring a licensed social worker to work with at-risk youth. Apparently she was not aware that, unless she applied for a waiver to do so, New York State would treat that hiring as a felony. You read that right: In our state, social service organizations are not allowed to hire licensed social workers.

Ex-prostitute makes a difference for women on Asheville streets
Asheville Citizen-Times
Robinson is a former sex worker who is now working toward a degree in social work at AB Tech. She is also an active advocate for Our Voice and works in local prisons to help sex workers and addicts get into recovery.

Bobbie Isaacs. Photo courtesy of Newsday.

Even after she retired, Long Island social worker Natalie “Bobbie” Isaacs continued to practice her craft, according to this article in New York’s Newsday.

Isaacs, 82, helped volunteers bring in dogs to comfort other residents at the Haverford, Pa., senior living community where she and her sports columnist husband Stan lived after they retired  six years ago.

Isaacs died on Jan. 22 from cancer. She had worked for almost 30years at Brookville’s AHRC-Nassau,  (formerly known as the Association for the Help of Retarded).

“She listened to people,” said Andy Weickert, a colleague at AHRC-Nassau. “That is what social work is all about. She exemplified what social work is.”

Isaacs is survived by her husband, daughters Nancy Reznick, Ann Isaacs Basch, and Ellen Isaac and four grandchildren.

Interview and inquire to find a therapist who’s a good fit
Kansas City Star
An Internet search for umbrella organizations also can lead the way: the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers, for example.

ACLU Hoping To Stop Anti Domestic Partner Benefits Law
WSJM
And Maxine Thome, with the National Association of Social Workers, sees the law as discriminating against homosexual couples because in Michigan they can’t legally marry to get insurance for their partners.

Forget the Shame and Other Advice For Facing Addictions
Patch.com
By Ben Feldheim Editor’s Note: This article is not meant to replace treatment by a professional therapist, psychiatrist or licensed clinical social worker. Consolidated High School District 230 isn’t the only entity in the area looking to raise awareness of drug and alcohol among area teens and young adults.

Social Work Degree Guides’ Provides Students with Advice
Middle East North Africa Financial Network
One type of degree program that is appealing for a wide variety of reasons is a masters in social work. People who have earned a social work degree typically qualify for many different types of interesting and fulfilling careers.

Half of social workers feel ‘powerless’ to prevent child neglect
The Guardian
More than half of social workers feel “powerless” to intervene in suspected cases of child neglect, according to an annual review into child neglect. The key finding was from research by the children’s charity Action for Children in partnership with the University of Stirling, which was based on interviews with more than 4,000 people including social care professionals, local authorities and the public.

At last, a documentary that presents social work in all its complex glory
The Guardian
The degree of access the programme-makers got to the families and social work practice is remarkable. They repay this by providing a vivid depiction of what it is like to be a social worker going into family homes, checking for signs of neglect, being confronted by dangerous dogs, and poor, sometimes disgusting, home conditions.

Speaker recalls social justice work
Buffalo News
Agnes Williams’ work on Native American issues and social justice as a member of the Seneca Nation goes back to the early 1970s, around the time she earned degrees in social work and Native American studies from Syracuse University and the University at Buffalo.

Opinion: New Law Helps Foster Youth to Succeed After 18
San Jose Mercury News
Sokhom Mao is a data specialist with the California Social Work Education Center at UC Berkeley, and a commissioner with the Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Commission of Alameda County. She wrote this for the Contra Costa Times.

Professor considers factors behind childhood obesity
RU Daily Targum
Lenna Nepomnyaschy, a School of Social Work assistant professor, connects low-income with childhood obesity yesterday in Davison Hall on Douglass campus. Researchers have found a link between childhood obesity and father involvement among children with unmarried parents — a growing epidemic that is on the rise in the United States.

Outbreak of family tragedies
The Western News
According to many mental-health professionals, there is a stigma attached to the idea of seeking help from a professional — a therapist, counselor, clinical social worker, psychiatrist or psychologist — and is considered weak or embarrassing.

Interns help teens through unique program
Roseville Press Tribune
Now, the 23-year-old master’s student at Sacramento State said she has found her calling — social work. As part of her master’s program, Elias must devote 16 volunteer hours each week to social “field work” for hands-on experience, hours that she spends with the Roseville Police Department.

Reliance on shrinking government funds doomed Hull House
Chicago Tribune
Addams and Hull House eventually earned international reputations for public service. In recent decades, however, the association departed from Addams’ reliance on private donors and turned instead to government funding. That dependence — as much as 85 percent of its budget in recent years — along with the inability of its leadership to adapt to declining revenues eventually sealed the organization’s fate, those familiar with the association’s operations said.

Chase Beh. Photo courtesy of the Chicago Tribune.

Chase Beh’s parents turned to drug counselor Kimberly Even to help their 20-year-old son overcome his  addiction to heroin, according to this article in the Chicago Tribune.

However, Beh died from an overdose  in 2009 and it was found Even was not licensed to be a drug counselor in Illinois. The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation in 2009 had also fined her $10,000 for practicing unlicensed social work.

After Beh’s death Even continued to identify herself as a licensed clinical social worker and certified alcohol and drug counselor and  see clients, the article said.

Authorities eventually closed her North Shore clinic.

Even, 47, is now in jail, charged with depositing $75,000 in insurance company checks made out to a client’s father.

Beh’s mother said there should be a law in Illinois to make it criminal for a person to falsely claim they are a drug counselor.

“I can’t imagine how she could have been in practice and no one looked into her credentials,” Christine Beh said. “I think what she did was unconscionable. It’s a betrayal that I just think is unbelievable.”

To learn more about proper social work credentials visit the National Association of Social Workers Credentialing Center by clicking here.

Experts estimate there are 14,000 homeless people in the Garden State, up from 13,000 in 2009.

To learn more about the services social workers provide clients from all walks of life, visit the National Association of Social Workers’ “Help Starts Here” Website by clicking here.

Book Addresses Healing For Survivors Of Abuse
Webster Kirkwood Times
“We will be presenting it in March at the National Association of Social Workers of Missouri at the Lake of the Ozarks.” This is the second book by the Kirkwood psychotherapists.

Photo-Op: Steel Nerve
Wall Street Journal
Trained as a teacher and social worker, Hine (1874-1940) picked up a camera in 1904 so that he could offer photography classes at his school. Soon he was advertising his services in the field of ‘Social Photography,’ with a specialty in ‘graphic representations of conditions and methods of work.’ Commissions from the National Child Labor Committee produced some of his most haunting images: photographs of newsies, including one sleeping with papers for a pillow; a crowd of boy miners whose ghostly faces barely break the enveloping coal dust; a 5-year-old Mississippi shrimp picker.

Dancers say no to drugs: Crew helps teenagers stay sober
Pacific Daily News
On Talavera’s desk — which occupies a space that was once a set of toilets — is a picture of his original crew. There’s also an award from the National Association of Social Workers for exemplary service in 2011.

Has the sex stopped?
MyNews.in
“I’ve been a marriage therapist for 20 years, and I’d estimate that one in three couples struggles with this issue,” says Michele Weiner-Davis, author of The Sex-Starved Marriage. “It affects all types of people, regardless of age or years spent together.”

Mentor teaching young men in Detroit how to dream, see themselves in a better …
Detroit Free Press
Without that man, Lewis, who has a master’s degree in social work from the University of Michigan, says he could have easily been another statistic. African-American men remain twice as likely as white men to be unemployed, three times as likely to live in poverty and more than six times as likely to be incarcerated, according to a 2009 National Urban League report.

Aging and Life Quality: What Does the Future Hold?
Scientific American (blog)
“There seems to be a sort of fear, if you will, of aging,” said Valentine Villa, a California State Los Angeles Social Work professor and the director of the Applied Gerontology Institute. “In aggregate we are doing better in terms of health, in terms of socioeconomic status. We’ve been living longer.”

Kentucky social service workers face ‘crushing caseloads,’ panel told
Louisville Courier-Journal
Steve Beshear proposed adding $21 million to the state social services department that would be be used to hire 300 more workers — 91 front-line social workers and the rest family-support workers who handle public assistance cases for people seeking Medicaid, food stamps or other benefits.

Picking a therapist
Chicago Tribune
An Internet search for umbrella organizations can also lead the way: The American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers, for example. “We all have national professional associations.

Fatality raised more questions about Kimberly Even’s credentials as drug counselor
The Chicago Tribune
He died in 2009 of a heroin overdose while being counseled by Kimberly Even — a woman who had been warned to stop claiming she was a certified counselor by the professional organization that sets the standards for drug counselors, records show. The state also was investigating her credentials at the time of the death.

China’s unfledged social workers looking for support, recognition
Shanghai Daily (subscription)
Wang first came across social work while employed as a dustman in Beijing. When Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome swept the city in 2003, social workers called on his dorm to hand out disinfectants and masks. “At a moment when everyone was panicked by the epidemic, I had never known that there were still people who cared about the needs of strangers. I found social work a worthwhile career,” says the 31 year old from north China’s Hebei Province.

Brewer has already recommended adding more investigators and training and overhauling the hot line for abuse complaints. She has also proposed increasing the CPS budget by $3.7 million.

Putting Elders to Work in Aiken, S.C.
Governing
Aiken also encourages seniors to stay busy and engaged. One of the ways it does this is through Foster Grandparents, a federally funded program for senior citizens 55 and older. The participants visit schools, Head Start centers, nonprofit daycares and after-school programs to help at-risk children, says Director Toni Brunson.

Reforming Welfare Coverage
FAIR
The Louisiana chapter of the National Association of Social Workers held a press conference to outline their problems with that state’s plan, claiming that it “lacks the job training, transportation, child care, educational and labor market structures needed to facilitate meaningful change.”

1st Gabe Zimmerman scholarship awarded at PCC
KVOA Tucson News
TUCSON – The first Gabe Zimmerman Memorial Scholarship has been awarded by Pima Community College to a displaced worker who came to PCC to study for a new career in social work. John Roldán, 61, will be presented the $1000 scholarship this evening.

Teens Dealing With Cancer Find an Ally in The Who’s Daltrey
PBS NewsHour
She’s now a social work graduate student at UCLA and part of a growing chorus — one headlined by the likes of Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend of the classic rock band The Who — demanding more specific treatment and emotional programming for  adolescents. Rather than funneling teens into adult or pediatric programs, where they generally feel like outsiders, they say that teens should receive specialized attention.

Azikiwe Kambule. Photo courtesy of mugshots.com.

Outgoing Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour has pardoned nearly 200 people, including a South African man implicated in the 1996 carjacking death of a social worker, according to this Sentinel-Record article.

Prosecutors said Azikiwe Kambule and Santonio Berry killed social worker Pamela McGill because they wanted her red 1993 Dodge Stealth sportscar.

Kambule claimed he did not fire the shots that killed McGill. He was sentenced to 30 years for armed carjacking and five years for being accessory to a murder. Berry was sentenced to life without parole after pleading guilty to capital murder.

Anita Barbee. Photo courtesy of the Courier-Journal.

Budget cuts, staff reductions and heavy caseloads are hampering the ability of Kentucky social service workers to protect children, according to this article in the Courier-Journal.

Kentucky has about 1,300 social service workers, down from 2,000 a decade ago. At the same time workers are under increasing scrutiny over recent child death cases.

The situation has gotten so bad some workers are breaking down on the job, suffering from health problems or just quitting, observers said.

“It is a crisis,” said Anita Barbee, a professor at the University of Louisville’s Kent School of Social Work and a National Association of Social Workers member. ”It’s the constant erosion of the workforce, and cuts in services that have gotten us to this crisis.”

To learn more about how social workers help young people in crisis, visit the National Association of Social Workers’ “Help Starts Here” Kids & Families Website by clicking here.

Johns Hopkins University and the University of Minnesota are helping the agency create the screening tool.

Ten to 20 percent of the nation’s children are exposed to domestic violence, according to researchers. Information social workers gather through the questionnaire could be used in court to help judges decide whether families need counseling or other treatment.

“There is no specific protocol, and particularly for the really young kids, on how you assess the level of domestic violence,” said Kathleen King, a supervisor with Child Protective Services. “Social workers now get bits and pieces of that information, but it’s not all pulled together.”

Social workers help young people overcome life’s hurdles. To learn more visit the National Association of Social Workers’ “Help Starts Here” Kids & Families Website by clicking here.

New Report Highlights College Majors That Lead to Job Opportunities
U.S. News University
For instance, while students who study architecture could face unemployment rates around 13.9% due to the struggling construction sector, majoring in a subject like psychology or social work leads you into an industry with a much lower figure of 7.3%.

END OF THE WAR: The new veterans
San Angelo Standard Times
Juan Rubio served two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan as a Navy combat medic. Rubio is battling post-traumatic stress disorder while volunteering as a counselor to other veterans. He said he may pursue a degree in social work to help others.

Where Have All the Doctors Gone?
Miller-McCune.com
At Florida International University’s Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine, launched in 2004, teams of medical, nursing, public-health, and social-work students serve individual families in low-income neighborhoods. They spend four years collecting data on the families’ health problems and developing plans of care to address them.

Photo courtesy of Fox 5 in Phoenix, AZ.

Friends and associates of slain social worker Gabe Zimmerman held a six-mile hike on South Mountain near Phoenix, Ariz. in his memory, according to this Fox 5 article and video clip.

Gabe Zimmerman

Zimmerman, an aide to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and a member of the National Association of Social Workers Arizona Chapter, was killed in a mass shooting a year ago that left the congresswoman injured. He was an avid outsdoorsman and his friends thought a hike was an ideal way to honor his memory.

“Gabe was really one of the best people I knew,” state Rep. Katie Hobbs said.

To read the National Association of Social Workers’ Jan. 10, 2011 press release concerning Zimmerman’s death click here. 

Taking on bullying — on and off school grounds
Marshall Independent
“ABC started in the high school, basically with a lot of junior high kids getting on board with it,” said Deann Reese, licensed independent social worker at Minnesota Schools. “It’s totally run by them. A lot right now, is just raising awareness of bullying and what to look for and who to report to.”

Five Hot Careers for 2012
Yahoo
Career # 5 – Social Worker: If you’re eager to assist others and serve those in need, a career in social work could give you the fresh start you’re looking for in 2012.

New Report Finds That Risk of Unemployment Varies by College Major
Sacramento Bee
Median earnings among recent college graduates vary from $55000 among Engineering majors to $30000 in the Arts, as well as Psychology and Social Work. People who make technology are better off than people who use technology.

When eating healthy turns obsessive
CNN
“Body dysmorphia will make you miserable, and those with orthorexia tend not to have that,” says Alan Kaufman, a licensed clinical social worker who works with patients with eating disorders at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, in Berkeley, Calif.

How To Raise Responsible Kids
Huffington Post
“Kids need to feel that they are a part of something larger than themselves,” says Ruth Ettenberg Freeman, licensed clinical social worker and founder of Positive Parenting.

Whitaker, MSW, DSW, who is director of NASW’s Center for Workforce Studies, said it is hard to say whether educational costs are keeping people from pursuing a master’s degree in social work, which is considered a stepping stone to getting better paying jobs in the profession.

“Social workers are really drawn to this kind of work, and so sometimes the work overrides some other factors,” Whitaker said.

To find out more about what it takes to enter the social work profession, visit NASW’s BeASocialWorker.org Website by clicking here. And to learn more about the social work labor force and salary levels visit NASW’s Center for Workforce Studies by clicking here.

Janet Kohler. Photo courtesy of The Chadron Record.

Janet Kohler was paralyzed from the waist down in a car accident soon after graduating from high school in Nebraska.

Her family and friends said she never complained about her disabilities and kept a postive attitude, according to this obituary in The Chadron Record.

Kohler went on to earn a master’s degree in social work at the University of Missouri, which was more handicapped accessible.

She spent most of her professional life working at the California Mental Health Department, where she was director of patients’ rights, regional director of mental health programs and southern California director of forensics.

The California Senate also passed a resolution honoring Kohler for her service.

Kohler died from cancer last week at age 69.

“You always had a kind word and an encouraging smile. The world has one less caring soul today,” a friend posted on Kohler’s online obituary at the Orange County Register.