School of Social Work News

Associate Research Scientist Roland Zullo spoke with The American Prospect on the historical impact of unions on presidential elections.   

Unions “help working-class people get out the vote,” he said, because unions “underscore the importance of voting and educate members on why it’s important. One of the big effects unions have on politics and our society in general is they help make democracy work.”

Beginning in January 2025, the MasterTrack Certificate (MTC) program, currently available on Coursera, will change its name and platform. The same great content and curriculum will be available as the Social Work Essentials Certificate (SWEC) and will replace the MTC as our School’s certificate program. It will be hosted on Canvas and maintained by our own social work program. All existing course content will be maintained in the transition, with only minor changes to accommodate the Canvas platform. The transition will be finalized in April 2025 when Coursera will no longer offer the MTC Certificate.

The SWEC will continue to be a way for students with a social service work history to significantly reduce the cost of an MSW education at U-M. The certificate offers these students the ability to complete the MSW program in 45 credits (rather than 60). For more information, visit our website or email: [email protected].

Associate Professor Anao Zhang and PhD student Rachel Brandon are part of a team that recently received a grant from the Children's Cancer Research Fund. Their project evaluates the virtual delivery of a strength-based psychological treatment to young adults with cancer.   

“We are excited to receive this grant and conduct a pilot clinical trial at Michigan Medicine's Adolescent and Young Adult Oncology Program,” said Zhang. “It is also very exciting to involve Rachel Brandon, a joint social work and psychological doctoral student, as a study co-investigator and project coordinator to further boost the implementation of the trial.”

ENGAGE Program Manager Fatima Salman, MSW ’15, has been appointed Vice President of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW). Previously, Salman was president of the NASW Michigan Chapter and chair of the NASW Council of Chapter Presidents.

“I am excited to step into the role of vice president of this very critical organization that serves all social workers in the country,” said Salman. “I look forward to bringing my diverse background and strong skill sets to this organization and hope to be an asset as we champion social justice and empower social workers. I also am happy to be able to represent the University of Michigan School of Social Work —the top social work school in the country — in this national role.”

Nikole Hannah-Jones was the keynote speaker at the fourth annual Social Justice Changemaker Lecture presented by the School of Social Work at the Michigan Union in October 2024. 

Hannah-Jones is the Knight Chair of Race and Journalism at Howard University, where she founded the Center for Journalism & Democracy. Over the course of her career investigating racial inequality and injustice, she has earned numerous awards including a MacArthur Fellowship. But she is probably best known as the Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of the 1619 Project, which began as an initiative from The New York Times Magazine and has grown to include two books and a docuseries on Hulu. 

The 1619 Project aims to reframe American history by placing slavery and its continuing legacy at the center of our national narrative. Hannah-Jones discussed the project’s origins, aspirations and evolution in a conversation moderated by Professor Terri Friedline and Trina Shanks, the Harold R. Johnson Collegiate Professor of Social Work. 

The introduction to the event was given by U-M Vice Provost for Equity Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer Tabbye Chavous, who challenged the audience to draw inspiration from Hannah-Jones. She encouraged attendees to take every opportunity to tell their own story and not let it be defined by others.

“Most Americans had no idea of how foundational slavery was to the society that was built,” said Hannah-Jones, “so I really wanted a project that would force us to acknowledge that date — that if you know the date 1776 as a foundational date, you have to know 1619.” Each of the project’s essays focused on an aspect of American culture and showed the connection to slavery. As a whole, the project asks readers to consider how American history has been taught and how it changes through the inclusion of other perspectives and voices — in this case, through the lens of slavery.

“I became a journalist because I understood fundamentally that narrative — more than anything else — is what drives policy in this country,” she said. We can use narrative to create a better society, she said, but first, we need to use narrative to explain how our society was created.

“We have to be able to view a country with nuance and to say that we can't just own the good parts. If the Declaration of Independence matters, the fact that the man who wrote it enslaved 220 human beings matters, too,” she said. “And it doesn't say that we have to condemn the declaration because Black folks actually took those words and said, ‘this is a freedom document.’ You may not have intended this as a liberty document, but that is how we read it. And so we have to take all of our history together.”

We have to be honest about who we are, and then we can build a society that we want,” said Hannah-Jones. “America can be a great nation, but we are not a great nation by deluding ourselves and by accepting all of the inequality.” 

Hannah-Jones closed with a conversation about hope, which she admits can be difficult to find. “We have to understand that the change doesn’t happen overnight,” she said.

The Social Justice Changemaker Lecture was established by a generous gift from Dr. Neil C. Hawkins and Annmarie F. Hawkins, and the Hawkins Family. This annual lecture focuses on important global social justice issues including race and nationality, immigration and refugees, income inequality, gender identity and sexual orientation, education, health, and mental and physical disabilities.

The Social Justice Changemaker Lecture aims to bring prominent social justice experts and advocates from multiple disciplines including social sciences, science, humanities, the arts and other professions to the University of Michigan campus.

PhD Student Irene Routté has received the 2024 Outstanding Doctoral Student Award from the Association for Community Organizing & Social Action (ACOSA). This award honors meritorious scholarship in the field of community practice.

In 2018, ENGAGE launched the Small Grants Program to encourage faculty to build partnerships with Detroit community-based organizations and to support resident-led efforts to strengthen Detroit neighborhoods. These awards are supported by the Office of the Provost and are part of the School of Social Work’s strategic effort to connect Detroit engagement efforts and increase impact in the city. ENGAGE partners with the School of Public Health’s Detroit Urban Research Center in the administration of the small grants program. Here are this year’s grant recipients:

1. “Empowering Detroit Together: Building Community Impact Partnerships”
   Faculty Member: Clinical Associate Professor Abigail Eiler
   Community Partner: Yusef Shakur, Co-Executive Director, Michigan Roundtable
    
2. “Black Ecclesiastical Intervention to Help Equip Affected Lives Enduring Mental Disorders (BE HEALED)”
   Faculty Members: Professor Rich Tolman and Associate Professor Addie Weaver
   Community Partner: Pastor Charles Williams, Community Investigator

Professor Emerita Lorraine Guitérrez received the inaugural Maria B. Cerdas Trailblazer Award at the Latino Social Workers Organization’s National Latinx Social Work Conference in Chicago last week; she was also the keynote speaker. The award is named after Cerdas who became the first Latina member of the Chicago Board of Education in the 1960s.