Class Notes

I have a private practice specializing in working with older people and their families. I have published three books: The Caring Spirit Approach to Eldercare: A Training Guide for Professionals and Families, 2005; The Mindful Caregiver: Finding Ease in the Caregiving Journey, 2014; and Meaningful Connections: Positive Ways to Be Together When a Loved One Has Dementia, 2017.

I am a social work supervisor in a High-Risk Family Service Project with a team of 8 workers. Since 2014, we have helped over 700 vulnerable families in Taipei, Taiwan. It is a tough job to empower and intervene those families combined with mental illness and substance abuse problems. l appreciate the University of Michigan School of Social Work sending Ongoing overseas over the past 20 years, which has encouraged me to keep devoting my enthusiasm in the field of social work.

I have been the CEO of Jewish Family Service of Metropolitan Detroit (JFSMD) since 2011. Prior to that, since 2004, I worked at JFSMD, first as the Director of Older Adult Services and then as the Chief Program Officer. I worked for the Jewish Federation in Detroit as its NORC Director, helping older adults to age in place. Before that I worked for Detroit’s Jewish Vocational Service, supervising and managing a variety of programs and services including refugee employment services, supported employment services and school to work transition. Before this I worked at Wayne State University supervising a program that trained students to work in the Child Welfare arena. I started my professional career at JFSMD in the early 1990s as a clinical social worker in a family violence intervention program. I have served on the following Boards of Directors: Network of Jewish Human Service Agencies (NJHSA), Metro In-Home Solutions, Association of Jewish Family and Children’s Agencies, Oak Park Business and Education Alliance, Greater Detroit Network of Social Innovators, KADIMA and the Wayne State University School of Social Work Board of Visitors. I am currently the Chair of the Board of the NJHSA.

I continue to volunteer with CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) in the Family court where among other things I am the field supervisor for an MSW student. This uses my skills and knowledge of social services in the community. I also am on the grant making committee of a women's Giving Circle that pools our money and makes grants to programs that increase the self sufficiency of women and girls. I continue to be politically active locally and last fall put in a 17-hour day working at the polls.

Jen Rubin recently published a book, We Are Staying: Eighty Years in the Life of a Family, a Store, and a Neighborhood. The book is a memoir of Radio Clinic (a NYC small business her family owned for 80 years) and tells the story of the political economy of urban American through the life of Radio Clinic. We Are Staying is also an immigrant story, a grandfather-father-daughter story, a story of the unique character a family business brings to a neighborhood, and a reflection on what has been lost as stores like these disappear. Details on how to buy the book can be found here: https://www.rubinjen.com/we-are-staying--the-book.html

Roxanna Duntley-Matos, '11 PhD was selected in October 2018 by the Michigan Government Hispanic Latino Commission as one of the 50 Top Latinas in the state for her scholarly and community organizing achievements. Duntley-Matos was nominated for her leadership efforts during the Flint water crisis and her humanitarian musical missions with Puerto Rico and Mexico.

Jessica Wiederspan, PhD '17 dissertation research, "How the Ideology of the American Dream Persists in an Era of Economic Insecurity" is cited in The Washington Post, "Donald Trump's grotesque fraud".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/10/03/donald-trumps-grotesque-fraud/?utm_term=.a2accef3dbaf

Angie VanSchoick LMSW, LCSW was recently selected as a Director for the National Association for Court Management (NACM), serving a 2-year term. She has been the current President for the Colorado Association for Municipal Court Administration (CAMCA) since 2016 and looks forward to the additional role she'll be serving within her profession.

49 years after graduating from the University of Michigan, School of Social Work, I'm still a practicing social worker, working mostly with survivors of childhood trauma and dissociative disorders. I wrapped up a long career in NJ about 8 years ago when my husband and I moved to the DC Metro area to be closer to children and grandchildren (5 to date). My office is in Silver Spring, MD.

In 1999 I fulfilled a long deferred ambition to get my Ph.D. and I did so at NYU, completing a doctorate in one of the few remaining clinical programs in Social Work at the now re-named Silver School of Social Work.
I recently published my first book which I think is of interest to both lay readers and clinical communities: Emma and Her Selves: A Memoir of Treatment and a Therapist's Self-Discovery.
Writing and speaking about the book has been an exciting journey for me. And I love hearing from readers.

Ariana (Flood) Thelen is working in professional counseling and therapy at Identity Counseling, specializing in life transitions, family dynamics, elder concerns, grief counseling as well as anxiety and depression. She previously worked as a skilled nursing social worker, coordinating services for safe community living and transitions post-acute care, counseling in anxiety, depression, end of life, as well as interdisciplinary team (IDT) collaboration and policy improvement.

Judy Levick, MSW ’82 and Dr. Shari Munch, MSW ’82 co-authored a practice-based article in Advances in Neonatal Care Journal, entitled “NICU Bereavement Care and Follow-up Support for Families and Staff”, published in December of 2017. They collaborated with neonatal intensive care unit nurses who provide bereavement support at Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital where Judy was NICU Parent-to-Parent Partnership and Bereavement Follow-up Coordinator for 32 years. Dr. Munch is Associate Professor at Rutgers School of Social Work.

The Rev. Jonathan Vanderbeck (MSW, 2016) successfully completed his full social work licensure and recently began a new position with Samaritan Counseling Center in Scotia, New York. He works as a psychotherapist and specializing in issues of race, gender, and sexuality as it related to individuals of various faith traditions, and also serves as a minister of a local progressive Christian church.

Dr. Danielle Swick, MSW 2002 has received promotion to the rank of Associate Professor with permanent tenure at UNC-Greensboro.

Shannon R. Lane, MSW '99, recently co-authored the book Political Social Work: Using Power to Create Social Change, released in 2018 by Springer International. She was recently appointed Associate Professor and MSW Program Director at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut.

Guillermo E. Sanhueza, PhD ’14 Social Work and Sociology has been appointed Chief of the Division of Rehabilitative Programs for Chile by the Minister of Justice. His main responsibility will be the promotion and monitoring of successful, effective rehabilitative and decarceration programs for both adults and juvenile inmates in the country.

Michelle Feige is the Executive Vice President of the Association for the Accreditation of Human Research Protection Programs, Inc., a global non-profit that promotes high-quality research through an accreditation process that helps organizations worldwide strengthen their human research protection programs (HRPPs). Michelle is proud to report that the University of Michigan is one of 8 AAHRPP accredited organizations in Michigan.

Meaghan McMahon began MBM Consulting, her social impact consulting practice in July 2015. Since that time, she has worked with local government agencies, for-profit, not-for-profit and start-up organizations in both the Washington D.C. metro area and San Francisco. Learn more at meaghanmcmahon.com

Samuel Felton, MSW 2015 worked as a Medical Social Worker at Lakeland Hospital for two years, becoming a licensed clinical social worker. In December of 2017, he was hired into a new position at Lakeland Health Care System as a project coordinator, working to improve inpatient and outpatient experiences of Heart Failure patients.