InDepth Summer 2021

InDepth SMITH COLLEGE SCHOOL FOR SO CIAL WORK

SUMMER 2021

MAKING AN

IMPACT H O W

A C T I O N S

H A V E

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R I P P L E

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IMPACT MAKER: Jean Clarke-Mitchell, M.S.W. ’02, Ph.D. ’20, and current student Jenn Wahr share a smile during the 2019 Deepening Clinical Practice Conference where Clarke-Mitchell was a presenter.

Before Wahr came to SSW, Clarke-Mitchell was her clinical supervisor at the Elizabeth Freeman Center, the domestic and sexual violence organization in Berkshire County, Massachusetts.

I consider clinical supervision another tool supervisees utilize, along with modalities of inter­ vention, to work with clients.

It provides clinicians the support, additional education and guidance required to perform their work in the most effective and efficient manner. ­­­­—Jean Clarke-Mitchell on clinical supervision

InDepth is published by the Smith College School for Social Work. Its goal is to connect our school community, celebrate recent accomplishments and capture the research and scholarship at the School for Social Work.

In 2020 masks became the essential item no one expected and they played a crucial role in the day-to-day lives of many, including those on the Smith College campus.

MANAGING EDITOR

Laura Noel DESIGN

Lilly Pereira Maureen Scanlon Murre Creative CONTRIBUTORS

Dawn Faucher Laurie Loisel Faye S. Wolfe Megan Rubiner Zinn PRINCIPAL PHOTOGRAPHY

Shana Sureck

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR AND ALUMNI UPDATES CAN BE SENT TO:

InDepth Managing Editor Smith College School for Social Work Lilly Hall Northampton, MA 01063 413-585-7950 indepth@smith.edu ©2021

InDepth S MITH CO L L EGE SCHO O L FO R SO CI AL WO R K

SUMMER 2021

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Five Core Principles

An account giving of the creation of the five Core Principles and the School’s continuing anti-racism work

20 FO LLOW US O N:

Facebook facebook.com/ smithcollegessw Twitter twitter.com/ smithcollegessw Instagram instagram.com/ smithcollegessw YouTube bit.ly/SSWYouTube

Slowing the Spread How Kris Evans led in Smith’s COVID-19 planning

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Making an Impact

How three alums have made an impact through their contributions to SSW

DE P A RT M E NTS

02 From the Dean A note from Marianne Yoshioka

03 SSWorks School News + Updates Faculty Notes

31 Alumni News Alumni Desk Alumni Lives

36 Post Script An End Note

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M ARIAN NE R .M . Y OSH IOK A, M .S.W., M BA, PH .D ., LCSW

In It Together After a year, our ways of engaging and working have shifted dramatically.

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March 2021 marked one year since we shifted to remote work and learning.

Like everyone else, we were not antici­ pating the depth and duration of the physical distancing and masking man­ dates. We were preparing for what we thought would be a finite period of time to flatten the curve. By mid March 2020, faculty and staff were setting up work spaces at home and closing down their Lilly Hall office. We informed students and agencies that all students must stop in­person attendance at field sites as soon as possible. We had to consider how our students could terminate services appropriately with their clients. By early April, we had to end the field year, an extraordinary three weeks early.

A year later we have made myriad changes. Like all institutions of higher education we have spent a lot of time in Zoom rooms, mastering the use of break­ out rooms and other online tools for communication. It was a hard learning curve but many months later we have all grown remarkably adept with this new way of working, although it continues to have challenges. Without the layer of more informal information sharing that happens when you bump into someone on campus or walking down the hall, communication can stay in more formal channels unless there is an intentional effort to (re)create a sense of community in an online environment.

Community is a deep and important part of the Smith experience. I have been awed by the creative ways our community

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has gone about this. For example, students “walking to class together” via Zoom, or our twice a week informal Zoom gather­ ing for staff in Lilly Hall to drop in and see each other.

This year has also underscored the importance of relationships to work together well. There are areas of the com­ plex work that we undertake that require us to spend time together. Our work of understanding what it means to center our work processes, and decision making, and curriculum on the five principles is not just a list of tasks but requires us to think deeply about relationship and pres­ ence, dialogue and discussion, embodying and demonstrating what we value. Our work in all areas is deeply relational work.

This will remain unchanged.

We are starting to consider what parts of remote life we might want to retain once we are able to be fully in-person again. After a year, our ways of engaging and working have shifted dramatically.

This experience has invited new ways of thinking about teaching, learning and working that may open doors of access and opportunities for our community as we move ahead.

As with so many things, the challenge is how we retain that which is most valuable while also allowing us to stay open and actively engage with change, a requirement for us to truly live up to our five principles and continue to be the leader in clinical social work education.

I look forward to figuring it out together. ◆

SSWorks News from Lilly Hall IN THIS SECTION

SCHOOL NEWS FACULTY NOTES

IMPACT MAKER: A hallmark of every SSW education is its immersive field placements. For current student JP Gatete, his employment-based field internship working with the refugee and immigrant population at the Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts impacted his learning in several ways.

My first-year internship focused on collaborating with a licensed clinician to implement therapeutic objectives. The second year brought the role of master’s level in-home therapy clinician to intensive family and youth therapy. I learned about myself (use of self) in my clinical practice as well as how to better support clients and families using micro skills. —JP Gatete, current student

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Virtual Connections Lessons learned from a remote 2020 summer

The School for Social Work’s summer 2021 terms look, in some ways, much like the summer of 2020: Remote classes. No students living on campus.

But there the similarities end. In April last year, to accommodate the restrictions imposed by a global pandemic, the summer plan was entirely rebuilt. This year, the decision came early and had the benefit of a summer’s worth of learning.

The lessons were many.

To understand this summer’s plan, it’s necessary to get a glimpse at the way last year’s summer terms were built. With the decision made after students were already registered for courses, students had to be unregistered and new schedules had to be built that took different time zones into account.

“It was overwhelming what we had to do,” said Irene Rodriguez-Martin, Ed.D., associate dean for graduate enrollment and student affairs.

Since such a radical shift in the way teaching and learning took place had never happened before, planning, training and skill-building for instructors was immense.

“There was so much upheaval.

Our goal was to try to be responsive as much as possible, but it was like a fire storm of challenging dilemmas,” said SSW Dean Marianne Yoshioka, M.S.W., MBA, Ph.D., LCSW. Moving to remote learning ran counter to many of the foundational principles the School holds dear.

“This was a hard decision for all colleges and all social work programs, but it was particularly staggering for us as a program founded on principles of relational education,” she said “This is a program that often does not have

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visitors into classrooms because we are so mindful of the importance of the group development process within the classroom.”

In last spring’s planning, nobody knew what the curriculum and classes would actually look like, but they understood it wasn’t as simple as putting the syllabus online.

“It had to be a new kind of course,” Yoshioka said. “It was a steep learning curve.”

SSW’s Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Marsha Kline Pruett, M.S., M.S.L., Ph.D., assembled a team of technology experts, library staff and members of the planning team that had developed Smith’s undergraduate remote protocols.

“They were able to share what they learned and what they were trying,” she said.

They launched a series of training sessions on using Zoom for a classroom experience, from the nitty gritty of the chat function and breakout rooms to the pros and cons of synchronous versus asynchronous learning.

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For many of these lessons, Kline Pruett said, she and others reached out to colleagues at other institutions to consider tried and true strategies.

“We had a lot to draw from,” she said. “People were all working together and we were all in the same boat.”

Still, the haste with which the change was made led to a feeling of building the plane while flying it.

This summer will have the great advantage of learning from the experiences of last summer as well as feedback from surveys and conversations with students.

So, how will this summer differ?

Last summer, faculty created class structures that incorporated synchronous learning, but heavily relied on asynchronous learning based on the assumption that students would need to work within their own schedules.

Traditional requirements to attend classes were loosened in an effort to support students for whom remote participation proved a hardship.

Students were also assigned more work outside class.

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PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION DISCOVERS UNEXPECTED ADVANTAGES IN REMOTE TEACHING In 2019, School for Social Work Director of Professional Education, Mary Curtin, M.S.W. ’00, decided it was time to add virtual learning to the mix of offerings for working professionals in the field.

Though SSW’s dedication to relational work means in-person learning has long been preferable, Curtin said that she started offering virtual trainings as an avenue to provide easier access to the School’s professional education programs.

She launched them in 2019 as a series of short 1.5 hour lectures with a moderated Q&A. Many were offered midday so busy clinicians and social workers could fit them in during a lunch hour. Additionally, these courses are recorded and posted online so others can take them on demand. Over the last two years, with the addition of virtual learning and a clinical practice conference, SSW Professional Education has grown substantially.

When a global pandemic brought everything to an unceremonious halt, Curtin was thrilled to already have experience offering virtual learning and she was able to quickly transform the summer in-person seminars into year-round virtual seminars.

“I feel very lucky that I had already started running trainings online because we knew how to use the platform making the transition much smoother.”

An unintended consequence of these actions was It’s important to note there are two different models of remote that some students fell behind. Additionally, a fall education offered, each holding appeal to different people based survey indicated that the majority of students actually on their learning style and needs. Some are highly interactive with preferred synchronous learning. smaller groups and heavy use of breakout rooms, others are normally “They wanted more time to interact and hold discuslarger, and the teaching is more didactic. sions with each other,” said Kline Pruett.

Recreating interactive learning in the virtual environment has been This summer’s remote classes will be more participaeasier than anticipated with attendees building the same interaction tory with requirements for class attendance. and professional support as they do in person.

As Kline Pruett puts it, if last year’s policy was “Be here “It has been heartwarming to see this develop in classes,” if you can,” this year’s will be “Be here unless you can’t. said Curtin.

We want students to show up and they want to too.”

When in-person seminars are possible again, Curtin said she Yoshioka said the reworking of expectations has been expects there will continue to be a variety of virtual learning options largely based on feedback from students that played a in the mix because of the access it provides. big role in decision-making for this summer. “Students In 2020–21, Professional Education offered three free trainings on feel like they need each other,” she said. topics related to the social changes COVID-19 ushered in: the transiAnother change will be inviting students to create tion to telehealth therapy; issues of divorced co-parenting amid the structures that will make the summer work more pandemic; and helping Veterans adapt and thrive during COVID-19. smoothly and foster community despite distance.

SSW Dean Marianne Yoshioka, M.S.W., MBA, Ph.D., LCSW, said she Rodriguez-Martin noted that last year there was an is impressed by the success of Professional Education’s transition to effort to replicate many of the student groups that took online teaching and the collaboration between Professional Education place in person but few students took part. Instead, and the alumni relations and field departments.

She sees Professional students found ways to organically build community Education as very much a service to the School’s alumni. in important ways.

“Our Professional Education programs give us another important Students also requested opportunities to meet the way to connect with and create connections among our alums,” needs that arose. They asked for a mourning group said Yoshioka. to reflect on the losses ushered in by the pandemic.

Curtin, meanwhile, encourages Smith alumni to apply Rodriguez-Martin said she found these requests Submit a to teach.“We love to feature alums who would like to give heartening, reassuring her that while virtual learnProfessional presentations—they are doing so many amazing things ing and even virtual rituals were unfamiliar, they met Education and it is great to help them share that with others,” said important needs.

Proposal today!

Curtin. “Professional development is really about having “The virtual connections were sweet and warm ssw.smith.edu/ submitaproposal practitioners training practitioners.”—Laurie Loisel and thoughtful,” she said. —Laurie Loisel

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Faculty Notes Recent news and accomplishments

We welcome these new faculty members to our School for Social Work community and celebrate their arrival Liberation, Radical Imagination and Healing of Young People of Color

Assistant Professor Loren S. Cahill comes from a family of advocates.

Grandfather Clyde S. Cahill Jr. was the first African American federal trial judge in St. Louis and filed the first lawsuit to desegregate Missouri schools, among other anti-racist accomplishments.

Cahill described herself growing up as a “nerd through and through,” a straight-A student who took every science class she could get, “never tried to rock the boat” and from age three planned on being a doctor.

Then, as a teenager, she participated in eye-opening workshops with Stefan Bradley, professor, scholar and author of such award-winning books as Harlem vs. Columbia University: Black Student Power in the Late 1960s.

After seeing images of Black children assaulted by police dogs and fire

hoses during Civil Rights campaigns and learning how that resistance led to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Cahill changed course, deciding to become a professor like Bradley and “rock other students’ worlds.”

Cahill’s interest in healing spaces was also born then. In 2017, accepting a Distinguished Alumni Award from St. Louis nonprofit Cultural Leadership, which had sponsored those workshops, Cahill spoke eloquently of “humanity routinely denied to marginalized members of our community... children not afforded the luxury of making mistakes or having joy or being playful.”

Her interests led her to earn a B.A. in Africana Studies and education from Wellesley College and an M.S.W. from the University of Michigan. Earlier this year, she received her Ph.D. in Critical Social/Personality Environmental Psychology from the City University of New York.

In joining SSW, Cahill is realizing her youthful vision of committing he­rself to “academia and agitation.”

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Her dissertation, “The Space Love Maps: A Blackgirl Legend in Three Plots,” builds on the idea of relationship building, of creating “radical love sites” and “curated spaces where people can grow.” Taking up Dr. Robin Boylorn’s concept of “Blackgirl (one word/no space),” which, according to Boylorn, signifies “the indivisibility of race and gender in the marginalized lives and experiences of Black women,” Cahill explored places such as the Colored Girls Museum in Philadelphia. On an Abolition Science Radio podcast, Cahill explained that one of her questions was, “In a world that doesn’t always see our humanity or want us to experience the fullest definition of freedom or to be loved, how are Blackgirls daring to imagine or create and curate that space for ourselves?”

Last year, as an associate director at the Intergenerational Change Institute in New York, Cahill worked with youths ages 16 to 23 to help them map their neighborhoods, build online communities and learn how to engage in rigorous research as a basis for action. Projects included identifying unused city locations that could be homes to a community garden or a youth center.

In joining SSW, Cahill is realizing her youthful vision of committing herself to “academia and agitation.”

The School’s antiracism commitment was a real draw, and she plans to bring her research interests in liberation, radical imagination and healing of young people of color to her new position. An ongoing project is collecting oral histories, including from her family, digging into how kitchen and front porches can be safe spaces and powerful places, where family history and deep knowledge are shared.

And in her research and her teaching, she’ll be illuminating how students and communities can make such places themselves.—Faye Wolfe

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/ MORE / For complete bios of our outstanding faculty visit ssw.smith.edu/faculty

An Intersectional Approach to Research

In her studies and in her career, assistant professor Brandyn-Dior McKinley has explored areas where the fields of human development, family science and social work overlap.

Graduating from Cornell with a B.S. in human development, McKinley’s aim in getting her M.S.W. at Columbia was to deepen her understanding of the impact of larger social systems on the development and well-being of individuals, families and communities.

Her placement at a center that offered training in couples and family therapy with a social justice, feminist and anti-oppression orientation strengthened her interest in an intersectional approach to research.

In the Ph.D. program in human development and family studies at the University of Connecticut, McKinley investigated how race, gender, class and other social factors impact young grandmothers, married couples, Latinas and Black women. Her dissertation, “Negotiating Motherhood and Intersecting Inequalities: A Qualitative Study of African American Mothers and the Socialization of Adolescent Daughters,” focused on Black middleclass mothers, shedding light on the particular challenges—personal and systemic—they face.

Aware that Black mothers in general lack “legibility” within mainstream narratives about Black families, McKinley also had her own mother in mind. “I’ve had the question, what was my mom trying to do in raising me?

I wanted to explore aspects of Black mothering that received less attention in the literature.”

Always negotiating reactions to themselves as Black women—who often are not afforded the same respect and understanding as other middle-class parents—the mothers she studied developed strategies of

survival and resistance. Two such strategies are lending their professional expertise to support school initiatives and recruiting other Black families to create “culturally affirming networks” for their children.

‘hidden’ material and psychological impacts of racism.” She pointed out that middle-class Black families are not immune to the harms of racism, such as economic precarity.

Coming to SSW, McKinley is excited to have colleagues who share her interests and are researching related areas, “folks who grasp the nuanced and complex nature of families.” Another reason she is glad to be on campus: “It’s a wonderful experience to be in the company of those who share your values, who are committed to critical dialog, community building, radical listening, being vulnerable…who see you as the kind of scholar you are, who see you.”—Faye Wolfe Encouraging Belonging and Making a Difference

Additionally, these mothers were determined to enable their daughters to confound stereotypes and stigma, to persevere and thrive.

As unofficial, unacknowledged diversity counselors for their children’s schools, “they labor to transform institutions into hospitable places for their children—and for others,” said McKinley. Six years after beginning her research into their lives, McKinley retains her admiration for these women, for “their survival, strength, creativity, advocacy and resourcefulness.”

“When I’ve asked myself what it is these mothers are yearning for, longing for, it’s just for others to see them, [to see] their daughters and the folks they love, to see their humanity.”

“I’ve been asked what the significance is of studying upwardly mobile Black folks within the context of studying racism,” noted McKinley.

“I think my research highlights

Newly appointed assistant professor Shveta Kumaria is no stranger to the School for Social Work. She first taught at SSW in 2013 and returned in 2014, 2015 and 2017. During those years, she was a doctoral student in clinical social work at Loyola University Chicago, receiving her Ph.D. in 2017.

Originally from India, Kumaria earned an M.A. in clinical psychology at Delhi University and an M.Phil in clinical psychology at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences in Bengaluru, India.

Early in her career, Kumaria and a colleague designed an innovative program to train Indian NGO field workers—who might be in a community to administer vaccinations, for instance—to use assessment and diagnostic skills to provide much-needed mental health outreach and referrals.

“I’ve always been interested in building capacity,” said Kumaria.

In 2012, Kumaria and a co-researcher published a pioneering quantitative and qualitative study that surveyed 250 psychotherapists in India to collect and analyze data on what

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they identified as their strengths and limitations. This was one of the first studies of psychotherapists in India.

Her dissertation, “Practice and Practitioner Correlates of Psycho­ therapists’ Self-Perceived Clinical Wisdom,” also investigated therapists’ sense of self. As seems to be true of wisdom in general, Kumaria found that a psychotherapist’s sense of being in the zone tends to develop over time, through personal and professional experience. Her curiosity about clinical wisdom is ongoing, as she continues to research, she said, such questions as, “How do we as social workers practice it? How do we teach it?”

Other professional interests include clinical practice, psycho­ therapy integration, cultural factors in psycho­therapy and teaching methods and pedagogical inquiry.

A course she began teaching at Smith in 2013, Cognitive Behavior and Therapy: Integrating CBT and Psychodynamic Techniques, has been a hit with students.

Most recently she has been an associate researcher and therapist at The Family Institute at Northwestern University. She has studied bystander intervention as it relates to LGBTQ bullying and developed talks for therapists on such subjects as eating disorders in trans clients and the counseling of parents whose children have come out as nonbinary. In her first presentations on these topics, she was surprised by how basic some of the questions were from professionals, for example, about terminology. “It’s just so important to make this kind of information more accessible,” she said.

Kumaria approaches teaching with a similar desire to extend access to knowledge—and success. During her summers at SSW, she noted, “I’ve been drawn to the atypical students, the ones making a switch to a second career and members of racial or gender minorities or from marginalized communities. They often have had different or tougher journeys to get to this point in their lives, and they see things through a different lens. They have unique strengths—they’re not afraid.”

In her new SSW position, Kumaria will continue to encourage students’ “sense of belonging on campus and their drive to make a difference. Social workers need to believe in their ability to influence institutions and to know that, through their work, they can influence the world.”—Faye Wolfe Bringing Experience and Activism to the Classroom

Lecturer Alberto Guerrero brings to the Smith College School for Social Work a wealth of experience as both a social worker and an educator.

Guerrero leapt at the opportunity to join the SSW faculty this year,

Guerrero leapt at the opportunity to join the faculty this year, having been deeply impressed by the social workers he’s encountered who graduated from SSW.

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having been deeply impressed by the social workers he’s encountered who graduated from the school, and adjuncts who have taught in the program. In this new position, he’s looking forward to having, as he said, “the intentional opportunity to really learn from my colleagues—an amazing collection of educators, clinicians and social workers,” and “simultaneously being able to grow as an educator and as a clinical social worker.”

Although new to the full-time faculty, Guerrero is not new to SSW. He began as an adjunct in the summer of 2020, teaching Clinical Practice I & II, and through this academic year has been an instructor in the Field Instruction Lab working with students who needed to supplement their field placement.

In addition to his work at SSW, Guerrero has taught a wide range of courses in the social work pro­grams at Mary Baldwin Uni­versity, University of St. Joseph, Westfield State Uni­ versity and at UMass Amherst in the College of Education. He also has a background as a classroom teacher, having worked in both a middle school in Chicago and secondary schools in Ongata Rongai and Nyeri, Kenya.

Guerrero earned a degree in elementary education at Manhattan College and an M.S.W. at the Silberman School of Social Work at Hunter College.

Before continuing his education, he worked as an outpatient mental health clinician in the South Bronx and provided clinical services in the New York legal system, advocating for reduced sentences for individuals with pending cases.

In 2020, Guerrero completed his doctorate at UMass Amherst’s College of Education in their social justice education program. In his

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doctoral research, Guerrero addressed the experiences of formerly incarcerated adolescents who have returned to schools that incorporate zero tolerance policies. In this work, which was the first of its kind, he showed that these adolescents were traumatized not only by their incarceration, but by their experiences of living in communities and attending schools with constant police surveillance, which had a profound impact on their ability to be present and successful as students. Although further work on the subject was put on hold because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Guerrero intends to expand on this work with the hope that it can lead to policy changes on how we treat adolescents in the justice and educational systems.

—Megan Rubiner Zinn A Safe, Holistic Space

As a scholar, educator, therapist and yoga instructor, lecturer JaLisa Williams aspires to decenter whiteness, encourage mindfulness and create safe, holistic spaces where people of color feel at home.

Williams earned her M.S.W. at Metropolitan State University of Denver, where she has continued as an instructor, teaching Power, Oppression, and Privilege: Creative Approaches to Change, Centering Black Experiences in Social Work Practice and Gender and Social Work. Williams also teaches at Regis University, where her courses include Thugs, Hos and Hip Hop (a play on the Power, Oppression, Privilege course) and Radical Self Care.

Williams’ experiences as a student of yoga and social work have significantly shaped her research. In the many years she has practiced yoga, she rarely saw other Black bodies in her classes. This inspired her research into mindfulness-based interventions for communities of color—how holistic practices are beneficial for people of color, especially those who have experienced trauma. As a social work student, she was struck by how much of social work practice has been based in white supremacy,

and this drove her to study antioppressive pedagogy and decentral­ izing white supremacy in social work practice.

As a therapist and yoga instructor, Williams has been mindful of filling the gaps in service to people of color, as there were not many Black therapists in her area working on a sliding-scale basis, nor were there affordable yoga classes where people of color would feel comfortable. In her therapy practice, Yemaya Innergy Therapeutics, Williams works with Black, Brown, Indigenous and Queer people navigating anxiety, depression and healing from both historical and current trauma. She loves to bring creative modalities and a mindfulness approach to this work. “Sometimes we’re not even going to concern ourselves with doing talk therapy today; we’re just going to do some yoga,” she noted. “My clients are often journaling, making vision boards or doing breath work at the beginning of our session.”

In her yoga practice, Soulflower Experiences, Williams offers traumainformed yoga, meditation and wellness workshops tailored to people of color. Locating her classes in predominantly Black areas of the city, keeping costs low and playing jazz and R & B, she takes a restorative yoga approach that is particularly mindful of how certain yoga positions may make participants feel vulnerable or spark an emotional release.

Williams has long been familiar with SSW, thanks to her colleague and mentor, Smith adjunct professor Tanya Greathouse, as well as other professors who are graduates of the School. As a new faculty member, she is excited about the opportunity to teach and learn in a new community. “I’m looking forward to seeing how much is different, how much I can add to the ways in which Smith works and the ways in which Smith focuses on decentering whiteness,” Williams said.

“I feel that a lot of schools love to talk about this, but they’re not honestly prepared to do the work. Smith seems to have the support and resources for faculty and staff navigating these systems.”—Megan Rubiner Zinn

As a therapist and yoga instructor, Williams has been mindful of filling the gaps in service to people of color, as there were not many Black therapists in her area working on a sliding-scale basis, nor were there affordable yoga classes where people of color would feel comfortable.

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Career as a Clinician-Activist Kathryn Basham, clinician, educator and leader in military social work, is set to retire

[ ON RETIRING ]

As a student at UC Berkeley’s M.S.W. program in the late 1960s, Kathryn Basham had a clinical theory course with Lydia Rappaport on one side of the hall and a social policy course with Ron Dellums on the other. Although no longer literal, this facility in moving between these two sectors of social work has characterized Basham’s career ever since.

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“I did not experience this profound divide—either you’re a clinician or you’re a social activist—I was educated to be prepared to do both.”

Basham worked as a clinician and educator for 15 years after completing her degree. She held positions working with impoverished and marginalized communities, as well as positions in the Outpatient Departments of Psychiatry at Montreal Children’s Hospital and the George Washington University Medical Center. This juxtaposition of environments gave her an extremely broad understanding of the field and the diverse communities social workers serve.

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Top: Kathryn Basham, at her 1990 commencement, is first in line behind faculty members Joan Berzoff and Catherine Nye. Middle: Basham, in 2007, posing with students (l–r): Debra Rubin, Ph.D. ’07, Ana Barrios, Ph.D. ’07, Chikako Nagai, Ph.D. ’07, Keith Platt, Rose Sullivan, Ph.D. ’09, Joanna Bettman, Ph.D. ’05, Nora Padykula, Ph.D. ’08 and Eunjung Lee, Ph.D. ’08.

Bottom: Basham presents Jim Drisko with a certificate of appreciation at the 50th anniversary of the doctoral program.

Between 1985 and 1990, Basham completed the Smith SSW Ph.D. program and became a resident faculty member in 1992. Over the course of her SSW tenure, Basham has chaired the Social Work Practice and Human Behavior in the Social Environment sequences and has taught multiple courses in psychological theory and practice in both the M.S.W. and Ph.D. programs. For a decade, she also served as clinical co-director of the Ph.D. program and editor of Smith College Studies in Social Work.

Basham has been a prolific writer of peer-reviewed articles and chapters on topics including trauma theories and practice; military social work; ethics and moral injury; and pedagogy and anti-racism, as well as the co-authored text, Transforming the Legacy: Couple Therapy with Survivors of Childhood Trauma. As a professor, Basham has particularly loved mentoring students and watching them develop as practitioner-scholars who synthesize psycho­ dynamic and social theories while implementing the School’s anti-racism efforts.

Throughout the field of clinical social work, Basham has become well known as a national leader in military social work. After growing up in a family of Veterans, and working with service members as a clinician, she developed an expertise in clinical practice and educa­tion focused on the effects of deployment and combat stress on re-integration.

As her reputation grew, Basham was invited to serve on three Congressionally mandated research committees with the Institute of Medicine at the National Academies of Science, investigating strategies to enhance the mental health treatment of military and Veteran families, yielding four co-authored texts.

In addition to developing Smith’s military social work elective, Basham worked with the Council for Social Work Education (CSWE) to establish military social work competencies and with the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) to design military social work certifications for practitioners. On a local level, Basham also actively participates with the Western Massachusetts Veterans Outreach Group.

In recognition of her contributions to the field, Basham received the “Greatest Contribution to Social Work Education” award from the NASW-MA chapter and was honored as a distinguished practitioner with the National Academies of Practice.

Although she retired from SSW in June of 2021, Basham plans to continue with her private practice, which she has maintained throughout her tenure at SSW, and pursue her research and advocacy with the local Veteran community. ◆

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An Experience-based Tenure James Drisko is retiring from a prolific career as practitioner, clinician, educator and writer

[ ON RETIRING ]

Over the course of his career, James Drisko received many accolades: he was elected to the National Academy of Practice in Social Work, named an inaugural Fellow of the Society for Social Work and Research and honored

by Massachusetts NASW with their “Greatest Contribution to Social Work Education” award.

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Although disparate in their subjects, taken together these recognitions beautifully illustrate the well-honed combination of roles—practitioner, researcher and educator—that made Drisko such an asset to the School for Social Work.

As the child of social workers, Drisko quips, his connection to the field is genetic, but his environment also prepared him for his career. He grew up in the diverse community of Yonkers, New York, but spent several weeks a year in his father’s homogeneous hometown of Columbia Falls, Maine. As Drisko observed, “Cultural and class differences were obvious to me early on.”

Drisko’s perspectives were also shaped by his experience as a Vietnam War conscientious objector, when, for his alternative service, he spent three years provid­‑ ing childcare in a racially diverse residential treatment center in Albany, New York. Inspired by this work, Drisko earned his M.S.W. at SSW and went on to work in public community mental health before completing a Ph.D. at

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Top: James Drisko represented CSWE and NASW at the White House Social Work Conference in 2013.

Middle: Carol Brill, NASW-MA executive director, Drisko and Marianne Yoshioka, SSW dean, at the Women’s March in 2016.

Bottom: Drisko poses with the sea level sign in Rocky Mountain National Park. Drisko was an FFA to students in the Denver-Boulder area for 20 years.

Boston College. Drisko returned to SSW in 1984 as an adjunct M.S.W. thesis advisor and joined the resident faculty in 1989.

In Drisko’s view, his tenure at SSW was very much a continuation of his education. He learned a great deal about teaching, research, theory and writing from his fellow faculty members, while his students helped orient him “with their self-reflection, critical questioning and investment in learning.”

In turn, Drisko’s pedagogy and leadership also shaped the School. He primarily taught practice and research courses as well as child development and child treatment, served for 12 years as M.S.W. Research Sequence chair and was a faculty field advisor for the Denver-Boulder area for nearly 20 years. He was also the first faculty member to do both Ph.D. field and research advising, and he participated in the development of the School’s anti-racism commitment. In 2001, then Professor Joyce Everett, (now Professor Emeritus), and Drisko obtained the largest external grant in the School’s history to study the implementation of Casey Family Services’ Family Unification Programs.

Drisko contributed extensively to the broader field of social work education. Known for his clear writing style and ability to communicate complex ideas, Drisko published widely on research methods, clinical practice and social work education, among other subjects.

He also developed expertise in qualitative research and taught over 1,000 people in workshops on the subject.

Throughout, he’s continued to practice as a clinician and provide supervision to M.S.W. licensure candidates.

Drisko is deeply appreciative of the role that SSW has played in his career. “It has been an honor to teach at Smith and to be part of this wonderful, vibrant learning and teaching community.” After his retirement in June 2021, Drisko plans to remain connected to the college and the field, continuing to learn and write, and to see his current Ph.D. students through their dissertations. ◆

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CORE PRINCIPLES An account giving of the creation of the five Core Principles and the School’s continuing anti-racism work

BY JANAE PETERS, M. S. W. ’ 1 5 , I N T E R I M A SSO C I ATE D I REC T O R OF FIELD EDUCATI O N A N D PRI O RI T I ES C O M MI T T E E MEM B E R

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1 PRIORITIZE INTENTIONAL ACTION OVER STANDARD LOGISTICS.

2 ENSURE ACCOUNTABILITY AT THE INDIVIDUAL, PROGRAM AND INSTITUTIONAL LEVELS AND THAT THERE ARE MEANINGFUL PROCESSES FOR REPAIR AND RECONCILIATION.

3 CENTER COMMUNITIES THAT HAVE BEEN MARGINALIZED FOR THEIR STRENGTH, KNOWLEDGE AND BEAUTY.

4 ENSURE THAT BLACK FACULTY AND STAFF AND FACULTY AND STAFF OF COLOR ARE HIRED AND RETAINED AT ALL LEVELS OF POWER IN THE ORGANIZATION.

5 STAY OPEN TO AND ACTIVELY ENGAGE WITH CHANGE.

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SUMMER 2020 DEMANDS

ALUMNI AND STUDENTS DEMANDED THAT SSW TEAR DOWN RACIST STRUCTURES THAT PREVENT BLACK PEOPLE FROM GAINING RESIDENT FACULTY POSITIONS, CREATE AN IMMEDIATE AND TRANSPARENT SEARCH AND HIRING PROCESS WITH BLACK STUDENTS AND ALUMS ON THE COMMITTEE AND ATTEND TO THE LACK OF BLACK SUPERVISORS AND FACULTY FIELD ADVISORS, AND, IF THESE DEMANDS COULD NOT BE MET

BY THE END OF SUMMER, REMOVE ITS ANTI-RACISM COMMITMENT.

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The work of this piece is to offer an account-giving of the creation of the School’s five Core Principles and to give some insight into the work of the Priorities Committee. In it I hope to illuminate the intentional action of what has been happening and to illustrate how we are putting the principles into action to move us forward as a community with a mind towards transformational processes.

In many ways, the five Core Principles have grown out of years of harm, activism, organizational change and injustice. In spring 2020, a multi-constituent working committee, the Anti-Racism Planning Group (ARPG), held and acknowledged that history and through a thoughtful and creative process offered the five Core Principles to the community as a foundational structure upon which we will operate and teach and learn together. Our committee’s original mandate was to continue Drawing upon precepts from anti-racism, the efforts of the resident faculty racial justice, racial equity and decolonization frameworks, drawing from the lived to examine and re-envision the experiences of the committee members at SSW and in the community and working School’s Anti-Racism Commitment from a relational approach we drafted five core guiding principles as a guide for our (ARC) and to create structure for School and our future.

During the field year, resident faculty the larger community to engage had read and discussed read­ings and theories in three categories: racial justice, in the work of re-envisioning what racial equity and anti-racism. The original idea was that this multi-constituent work group, the Anti-Racism Planning Group an ARC might look like for SSW (ARPG) would engage these readings and more and create structure for the larger today. What the committee created community to engage the work of reenvisioning what an ARC might look like was powerful. for SSW today. The workgroup’s makeup

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included BIPOC students who served in Council leadership positions, students who served on the Trans and GNC Work Group, three BIPOC adjunct faculty, and two BIPOC resident faculty. The intent was to ensure that our work would be infused with the wisdom, strengths and beauties of our positionalities, histories, ancestry and visioning. On May 31, 2020, we had our first meeting to orient ourselves to the mandate as it was set forth in March and quickly discovered that the work that needed to happen in the community had already shifted in a significant way.

The global uprisings that followed George Floyd’s murder brought into stark relief the ways in which power is held in our society and maintained through the use of violence and other terrors, and the creation of financial barriers, educational barriers and environmental injustice, among other ways. Though it is certainly true that students at Smith SSW had been speaking out long before 2020, there was a level of urgency for change at SSW when recent changes on the resident faculty meant that there were no Black members of the resident faculty. The confluence of context, racial violence and injustice in the country and a pandemic which brought all of our conversations to the virtual realm laid the foundation for our committee to start imagining what accountability looks like for an institution like Smith SSW. The core principle that asks us to ensure accountability at the individual, program and institutional levels, and that there are meaningful processes for repair and reparation signals that this is not action to which we only commit once—we have to be in the practice of ensuring accountability in order for the institution to transform into one that can hold space for healing and repair.

So when an SSW alum together with the Council for Students of Color issued a challenge that summer that SSW tear down racist structures that prevented the successful hiring of

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Black people into instructional and advising roles or desist in its Anti-Racism Commitment, the mandate of our workgroup shifted to one that required radical and intentional action.

During a time when many schools were creating anti-racism statements and commitments, our workgroup’s constituents proposed that the School’s historic anti-racism commitment be replaced with guiding principles that would support in practice what the ARC offered in theory, principles crafted for a different community with different needs than the ones of 1996 when the commitment was first written.

We learned about the historical context of the formation of the ARC from some of the resident faculty members who authored the commitment. Professors Josh Miller, Kathryn Basham and Jim Drisko each sent us video narratives and account givings of the times that birthed the ARC. We assessed and analyzed the narratives highlighted by voices from the 2016 student protests, Smith Speaks surveys, Zanzig & Gray’s climate study and the demand letters from 2020 to ensure that those harms, needs and voices would be addressed by our work.

By the end of summer 2020, our workgroup had a draft of the five Core Principles. On August 14, Dean Yoshioka wrote to the SSW community to announce that SSW would adopt these principles to guide the work and curriculum of the School.

These principles are about action and how they are implemented is where transformation occurs.

Starting in fall 2020 the dean convened what was called the Priorities Committee. Four members of the ARPG serve as members of the Priorities Committee. One of the benefits of this overlap has been that the ARPG’s summer work is carried forward.

The Priorities Committee’s mandate was to examine all of the feedback and demands the School had received

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over the past five years, consider the historical context in which we have operated, and are operating, and engage the five principles for the purpose of setting the priorities on which Smith SSW should focus with time frames, structures and plans. We began by sorting and organizing the feedback and demands to inform a decision about what needed to be “fixed” first.

Committee Member Keshia Williams asked a key question of us that shifted our perspective and how we understood this work: How would our work together shift if we approached the work itself through these principles, embodying and manifesting them in our meetings, what we paid attention to, how we made decisions? How/ where do the core principles live in our respective and collective professional and personal worlds?

This shifted the way we conducted our meetings and together we moved to a more relational way of working, holding ourselves and each other accountable to the principles. We begin each meeting with a check-in, a personal reflection about which principle or principles were most salient to us that week. We worked to center the principles through our discussions of how to bring the principles into processes and practice.

We cannot bring the transformational shift to the culture of the School if we are not considering deeply where they live in our worlds and how we practice them every day. Each of us must embody these principles so that we build the muscle memory to create and bring them to life across all parts of SSW. A first place where the principles were used to guide and transform a School process was in the hiring procedure for new resident faculty.

The resident faculty set aside the standard ways of going about a faculty search and created an intentional search process setting the precedent for future processes. The search process grappled with the lessons learned from faculty departures and past searches and worked to intentionally

alleviate some of the barriers that make it difficult for BIPOC faculty to envision a professional life at Smith SSW. It is incredibly exciting to be welcoming five excellent new faculty to the community, but/and the work of repair and community healing is still at its very beginning stages.

The lessons from having a 25-year-old anti-racism commitment teach the importance of staying open to and actively engaging with change.

The principles themselves, the processes, structures and embodiments they generate need to evolve with the environment. These principles work together to create and support the type of learning environment that continually reflects upon itself and works to bring BIPOC experiences, knowledge and wisdom and the experiences, knowledge and wisdom of other marginalized communities into the center, and to promote intentional and action-oriented anti-racism practices at all levels of the institution. Part of what it means to strengthen the community using these principles as the core is that so many other muscles can be built when you have a strong core.

One of the next steps in our process will be to work on creating the structures and processes that create an accountable School culture, one that creates spaces and processes for repair and reconciliation. The language of “creating structures and processes” is in and of itself intentional. This will work best when we first get to know these principles for ourselves to discover where they live in our personal worlds, Smith SSW worlds and the large spaces and/or interstices where both of those meet. ◆

SUMMER 2020 ANTI-RACISM PLANNING GROUP en Bigney, current student B Lauren Greis, current student ■ Jordan Alam, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Chris Ferrari, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Naomi Johnson, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Liz Fitzgerald, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Saer Smith, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Caitlin Tengwall, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Caroline Wilson, M.S.W. ’20 ■ Natasha Campbell, B.S.W., M.S.W., LICSW, adjunct assistant professor ■ Tamarah Moss, M.S.W., M.P.H., Ph.D., adjunct assistant professor ■ Rory Crath, M.A., Ph.D., assistant professor ■ Megan Harding, M.S.W., senior lecturer ■ Marianne Yoshioka, M.S.W., MBA, Ph.D., LCSW, dean ■ Janae Peters, M.S.W. ’15, project manager ■

TO WHICH PRINCIPLE(S) DO YOU GRAVITATE?

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PRIORITIES COMMITTEE ndrés Hoyos, M.S., M.S.W., A LCSW, adjunct assistant professor, faculty field adviser ■ Janae Peters, M.S.W. ’15, former Sotomayor Fellow ■ Keshia Williams, M.S.W., LCSW, former Sotomayor Fellow, faculty field adviser ■ Rory Crath, M.A., Ph.D., assistant professor ■ Megan Harding, M.S.W., senior lecturer ■ Marianne Yoshioka, M.S.W., MBA, Ph.D., LCSW, dean

WHICH ARE YOU CURIOUS TO EXPLORE AND REFLECT UPON IN YOUR WORLD? WHICH DO YOU NEED TO STRENGTHEN? WHAT IS MISSING FOR YOU IN THESE PRINCIPLES AND WHERE DOES THAT LAND FOR YOU?

■

WHAT IS YOUR HOPE AND VISION FOR EACH PRINCIPLE? WHERE ARE YOU ON YOUR JOURNEY TO EMBODY THESE PRINCIPLES AND YOUR COMMITMENT TO ACTION IN SERVICE TO THEM? S UMM ER 2 02 1

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Kris Evans, LCSW and current Ph.D. candidate, poses for a photo on Smith’s campus early in the pandemic.

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K

ris Evans, newly-appointed director of Smith College’s Schacht Center for Health and Wellness, had her first taste of COVID-19’s impact when a few of Smith’s undergraduate students returned in early 2020 concerned about their health.

Fortunately, none had contracted the virus. The next indication of the oncoming crisis came soon after, when study abroad programs began shutting down, sending students back to the United States. By spring break it was clear that a crisis was at hand. The college mobilized quickly to protect students’ health, and as the Center’s then interim director, Evans was thrust into the extraordinarily challenging position of managing key elements of this process.

Kris Evans led the development of the Smith College testing and contact tracing team.

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Evans, a doctoral student in the School for Social Work, began at the Schacht Center as the associate director for the Counseling Service in 2016, and had only taken on the role of interim director of the entire Schacht Center in November of 2019. Evans has also been an SSW adjunct professor since 2012, teaching a range of practice and theory courses and coordinating the comparative psychodynamic theory course.

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As a doctoral student, Evans has focused on clinical training. “I am concerned about the medicalization and commodification of mental healthcare and how this has the potential to trickle down into clinical education, with treatment manuals and approaches that are often normed on dominant identities,” she explained. In her research, Evans hopes to explore how institutions can educate social workers to be critical thinkers and to embrace treatment models that serve a full range of human experiences and circumstances.

During the pandemic, Evans has had three primary roles. She is a planning consultant to the college at large, sitting on the COVID-19 Incident Response Team (CIRT) and chairing one of six health-working groups. Secondly, she has guided the massive transition of the Schacht Center to largely delivering remote health, wellness and counseling services to undergraduate students.

Lastly, she has led the rapid development of the Schacht Center’s COVID testing and contact tracing team.

These responsibilities come with some expected, and some unexpected challenges. “I think the biggest challenges have been building entirely new infrastructures, in very, very short periods of time. I often say it was like building an entirely new Schacht Center,” Evans observed.

From the start, Evans and her team had to ensure that they were able to maintain Smith’s excellent student safety net remotely, finding new ways to connect students to their programming and services. They have needed to rethink how to remove barriers to student equity and inclusion, such as lack of proper technology, internet connection or quiet spaces to work or engage in therapy and programming, new family and economic responsibilities and time zone differences.

They’ve also had to navigate licensing restrictions that make it difficult to provide services to students across state and country lines.

With a lot of ingenuity, Evans and the Schacht Center team have found ways to meet undergraduate students’ needs in spite of the challenges. They

Evans was instrumental in working with Smith College administrators to respond to COVID-19.

offer telehealth medical care where licencing allows, and wellness programming, with a particular focus on wholeness and connection. They’ve maintained individual and group counseling and psychiatry care, and have added expanded coaching and affinity support groups. They are also engaging in bridging work—helping students get connected to health services in their home area to assure continuity of care. Finally, they are providing some in-person care to the small number of students on campus or living in the Northampton area.

Throughout the pandemic, Evans’ SSW training has been instrumental in informing her priorities and strategies, particularly social work’s biopsycho­ social, social justice and trauma responsive perspectives.

Evans’ biopsychosocial perspective dovetails naturally with that of the Schacht Center, because it is fundamentally a biopsychosocial entity. “We have departments that intersect and overlap to meet all of those domains, so when we think about a COVID response, we’re naturally thinking about the economic, the social and the political challenges on top of the physical and mental health challenges,” she explained.

The Schacht Center’s commitment to racial justice is also paramount in supporting the wellbeing of Smith students.

“Our social justice perspective allows us to pay attention to the issues that were taking lives before the pandemic, and could potentially take lives beyond the pandemic if we don’t continue to actively address them.” To that end, they have expanded programming

informed by racial justice, including affinity groups for students with particular identities who may experience unique challenges during the pandemic, programming that supported students through the election cycle and support for students whose civil rights are threatened.

Finally, Evans and her staff have focused on creating a sense of safety for students in what feels like a fundamentally unsafe time, maintaining an awareness of the stages of trauma responsiveness— safety, processing and reconnecting— in everything they do.

Evans is not only grateful for the training the SSW has given her, but the people as well, as most counseling service staff members are SSW graduates. She’s been deeply impressed by the dedication, skills and creativity of these and all of her colleagues. “There’s such good work coming out of the Schacht center,” she said. “It’s all the folks who are boots on the ground, providing the therapy every day, showing up to provide the asymptomatic COVID tests or putting together a social media campaign to meet a unique need related to the pandemic.”

No matter what direction Evans takes when she leaves graduate school, she can already see how the pandemic will shape her future work. She’s had the unusual experience of simultaneously being a staff member, faculty member and student while managing an ongoing campus-wide emergency, and has seen how holding that middle space among multiple constituencies allows her to better serve her clients (in this case, students). “I think this middle space is actually a potential space, in that it gives me the ability to see many, many perspectives from a vantage point I wouldn’t otherwise have,” she observed.

“I’m starting to really value the ways that—through relationship building and bringing all those voices to the table—we can have a better response to whatever challenges we face.” ◆

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MAKING AN IMPACT How three alums

have made an impact through their

contributions to SSW

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ALL PROFILES WRITTEN BY ME GAN RUBINER ZINN

Smith SSW, like all nonprofits, relies on the generous donations of alumni and friends to provide financial aid to students who otherwise would be unable to afford the Smith experience, and to provide an unmatched graduate education that produces the very best trained clinical social workers. ¶ From the beginning, alumni, faculty and friends have strengthened our School through their philanthropic support. The earliest fundraising efforts for the School were led by Esther C. Cook of the Class of 1918. Miss Cook organized her classmates to develop a scholarship fund to which she contributed annually until her death in 1988—at which time the School benefitted from a generous bequest. ¶ In this issue we introduce a few current donors who have made an impact on the School in their chosen way: Laurie Peter, M.S.W. ’91 and her spouse Betsy Bernard support the School with unrestricted gifts to the Annual Fund; Bruce Thompson, Ph.D. ’87 who along with friend Steven Cadwell, Ph.D. ’90 (now deceased) created the Fund for the Advancement of LGBTQ Studies in Clinical Social Work; and J. Camille Hall, Ph.D. ’04 who plans to fund a scholarship by making Smith SSW a beneficiary of her life insurance.

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INVESTING IN THE FUTURE OF SOCIAL SERVICES LAURIE PETER, M.S.W. ’91 , and Betsy Bernard believe that when you have time and resources, you should use them to make the world a better place. Both retired from their primary occupations, they are able to devote their energy and resources to many organizations, primarily social service nonprofits addressing food and water insecurity, protecting vulnerable people and animals and supporting LGBT populations. The most notable outlier among the beneficiaries of their philanthropy is the Smith College School for Social Work, the only educational institution to which they consistently donate. In their view, giving to SSW is an essential part of their investment in social services, helping the School educate and train the social work leaders and practitioners who make the great work of these organizations possible.

“I don’t think we can have too many well trained M.S.W.s and this pandemic has shone a spotlight on how many more of those folks we need in the United States,” Bernard explained. “We’re donating to feed people, to house people, to protect people…. Smith is producing talent that is so necessary to help accomplish all those things.”

Peter and Bernard each bring different strengths to their philanthropy and their volunteer work.

Peter’s keen understanding of human services organizations comes from her upbringing, her education and her experience as a social worker in the healthcare system. Deeply influenced by her mother and grandmother, who had been dedicated to social service and civil rights in her native Kansas, Peter earned a master’s degree in counseling before pursuing her M.S.W. at SSW. She went on to work at Oregon Health Science University and Denver Health and Hospital, where she specialized in trauma, death and dying.

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Laurie Peter, M.S.W. ’91 (left) with Humphrey and Betsy Bernard (right) with Augie.

Peter and Bernard have made an impact through their unrestricted gifts to SSW.

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We’re donating to feed people, to house people, to protect people…. Smith is producing talent that is so necessary to help accomplish all those things.

“Being a student at Smith, getting an M.S.W., and then continuing that work into my internships and professional positions was very helpful in understanding that there isn’t a level playing field,” Peter observed. “It really heightened my awareness of and empathy for people doing their best to just get along, to raise families and to thrive.”

Bernard brings to the couples’ giving strategies an in-depth knowledge of corporations, operations and finances. Originally from Holyoke, Massachusetts, she earned an M.B.A. from Fairleigh Dickinson University and an M.S. in management from Stanford University’s Sloan Fellowship Program. Bernard spent three decades in the telecommunications industry, primarily as an executive at AT&T but also in senior positions with Qwest Communications International Inc., US WEST, Inc., AVIRNEX Communications Group and Pacific Bell. Most notably, Bernard concluded her corporate career by serving as the first woman president of AT&T. Peter first took on significant board responsibilities when the couple moved to Morris County, New Jersey for Bernard’s position at AT&T. With Bernard working around the clock, Peter put her skills to work representing AT&T on the boards of Jersey Battered Women’s Services (JBWS) and the National AIDS Fund. She also took on a fascinating and unusual project, working with the owner of Charles Jacquin’s et. Cie, Inc. to lead the research and development for Domaine de Canton, an all natural ginger cognac liqueur that launched in 2007.

Today, Peter still works with JBWS, serving on their advisory board, she co-chairs the strategic planning committee of SAGE (Services & Advocacy for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Elders) and serves as vicechair of the board of Dig Deep, which works to ensure that every American has clean running water. Peter also volunteers with Cafe of Life, a food bank in Bonita Springs, Florida, where the couple lives for part of the year.

Since retiring from AT&T, Bernard has continued to serve on the boards of several public companies. In the past, these included UTC, URS and the Principal Financial Group. She

is currently on the boards of LEAP Guarantee, as well as Zimmer Biomet, chairing the governance committee and serving on the audit committee of the latter. Bernard is also on the board of the nonprofit Family Promise, which works to prevent homelessness among families with children.

Peter and Bernard find their life of service enormously satisfying.

“The reward is seeing how it positively impacts people,” Peter asserted.

Bernard agreed, “For me it is those moments—it’s walking into a safe house and seeing moms and their kids with a good meal and a feeling of safety, and the little kids laughing, or seeing a family get water for the first time.”

When considering who to support, Bernard and Peter first and foremost choose organizations whose mission inspires them and those that address needs in underserved communities.

However, they also prioritize organizations that are well run, with effective diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices, strong leadership and demonstrated stability.

These priorities have made Peter and Bernard’s decision to give to SSW an easy one. They have great respect for the program and have been impressed with the leadership of Dean Marianne Yoshioka and her team, especially as they’ve guided the School through the upheavals of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Peter also appreciates how the School’s theoretical grounding and collaborative environment gave her the skills to navigate a challenging career. “I had a tremendous experience at Smith,” Peter asserts. “The School provides incredible clinical training to students who really want to serve.”

Peter and Bernard first donated to SSW many years ago when one of Peter’s favorite professors, Jerry Sachs, passed away, and then continued giving on a regular basis. In 2016, they gave a grant to the School to support research related to interpersonal violence among same-sex couples, and in honor of the School’s centennial in 2018 gave a $50,000 unrestricted gift.

They continue to give regularly to the SSW annual fund through their Donor Advised Fund. “We feel very committed to the work and the mission of the School for Social Work,” Peter asserted.

“I want to be a part of keeping this strong school of social work thriving.”

PAYING IT FORWARD FOR THE NEXT GENERATION BRUCE THOMPSON, PH.D. ’87 ,

never expected to be a philanthropist.

Raised in a family of modest means, and then choosing a career in social work, he didn’t anticipate that he’d be in a position to make significant financial contributions to organizations that were important to him. In recent years however, with a successful private practice and career in academia, Thompson has begun to think of his legacy and how he can make the most of the savings he accrued, especially in support of the Smith College School for Social Work. “I’d like to leave something behind that would be meaningful for the School and would be paying it forward for the next generation,” he explained.

It was in conversations between Thompson and Steven Cadwell, Ph.D. ’90, who also wanted to leave a gift to SSW, that they began to envision a plan to make the most of their donations.

In 2019, they created the SSW Endowed Fund for the Advancement of LGBTQ Studies in Clinical Social Work. As two of the first openly gay men in the doctoral program, they wanted to leave a legacy that would support LGBTQ students and scholarship at SSW in perpetuity.

Thompson’s interest in a social work career started with his desire to provide pastoral care as a Catholic priest.

In the 1960s he spent some time in a seminary, during which his collaboration with lay social workers, involved in both direct services and progressive social movements, broadened his perspective and presented an alternative to religious life. “It was the 60s after all,” he quipped.

Thompson earned an M.S.W. at Syracuse University in 1969 and a master’s degree at Harvard’s School of Public Health in 1972. Interested in health care and community services

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Bruce Thompson, Ph.D. ’87, established a scholarship for LGBTQ students with his friend and fellow alum, Steven Cadwell, Ph.D. ’90.

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Perhaps as always, entering the field of social work takes courage.

These days for many students, it means going into debt. Steve and I wanted to help lessen that debt and to support the overall advancement of LGBTQ scholarship at SSW.

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for older people, he took a position coordinating the development of the Home Care Program of the new Massachusetts Department of Elder Affairs. He followed this with another position administering the opening of Braintree Hospital, a new sub-acute rehabilitation facility aligned with Boston hospitals.

Although quite proud of these accomplishments, Thompson still wanted to work with individuals rather than planning and administering programs, and he shifted his career toward social work education and practice. In 1977, he joined the faculty at Roger Williams College in Rhode Island, coordinating their Social and Health Services Program. Eventually, Thompson saw that if he wanted to continue in an academic and clinical career, he would need a doctoral degree, and applied to the Ph.D. program at SSW. Attending SSW was a pivotal experience for Thompson. “It became an academic home for me unlike any other before it,” he recalled. “It was the beginning of what I knew was a very important and integrative step for me.”

When Thompson began at Smith in 1980, it was a revolutionary time to be a gay student in the program. There was a supportive cohort of students who had recently formed the first LGBT organization and had successfully worked to have sexual orientation added to the School’s non-discrimination policy.

“There was an emerging visibility of the SSW LGBT community and more dialogue about how the curriculum needed to reflect a healthier view of LGBT individuals and families,” he said. “The camaraderie, love, and support of the LGBT constituency at the School served as a kind of holding environment, encouraging students to become more authentically themselves, personally and professionally.” In this welcoming environment, under the leadership of Dean Katherine Gabel, Thompson was comfortable being out professionally for the first time. He adds that 1980 and the years of his doctoral work saw the emergence of the AIDS epidemic which was impacting him personally, noting that many of his close friends were falling ill and dying.

Thompson was not simply an observer of the changes in the School,

but had, according to alum Betty Morningstar, A.B. ’74, M.S.W. ’77, Ph.D. ’89, a “pioneering role in bringing LGBTQ clinical issues to the forefront.”

In response to the exponential growth of AIDS in the 1980s, Thompson wrote his dissertation on how gay men were responding to the threat of the epidemic. He and Caitlin Ryan, M.S.W. ’82, also developed two of the country’s first LGBT social work courses, “Gay and Lesbian Identity: Treatment Issues” and “AIDS: Clinical Social Work Responses.”

Throughout his doctoral education, Thompson continued in his position at Roger Williams and also began a private psychotherapy practice in Providence, primarily working with gay men with AIDS related issues. Additionally, Thompson was on the clinical faculty of Brown University’s Department of Community Health from 1988 to 1994, advising on issues related to AIDS. In 1990, in recognition of his contributions, the Rhode Island chapter of the National Association of Social Workers honored Thompson with their Social Worker of the Year award.

After graduating in 1987, Thompson consistently remained connected to SSW. Since the mid-’80s he has been on the adjunct faculty and has served as a thesis advisor, roles he’s found tremendously rewarding. In 1998, he and David Aronstein, M.S.W. ’80, co-edited HIV and Social Work: A Practitioner’s Guide, which included chapters by many SSW alumni and which was used widely as a textbook on AIDS. Thompson also serves on the editorial board of Smith College Studies in Social Work.

Thompson retired from Roger Williams in 2012, but has maintained his private practice. He still works primarily with gay men, but as HIV became a more chronic medical condition, his practice focus correspondingly expanded to issues that older individuals and couples face.

Since retiring from academia, Thompson has immersed himself in the kind of practice that originally drew him to social work—direct services to individuals. “It has been so rewarding to work with older gay men who are making meaning of their life experiences and stepping up to the many challenges of aging. Not exactly an unfamiliar terrain!”

By creating an endowed fund together, Thompson and Cadwell will help those newly entering the field experience the kind of career achievements and satisfaction they’ve enjoyed.

They also hope it will provide a designated destination for gifts large and small from fellow alumni who want to include SSW in their estate planning.

“Perhaps as always, entering the field of social work takes courage. These days for many students, it means going into debt,” he explained. Steve and I wanted to help lessen that debt and to support the overall advancement of LGBTQ scholarship at SSW.”

CREATING OPPORTUNITIES AT SSW THROUGH PLANNED GIVING J. CAMILLE HALL, PH.D. ’04 , was

profoundly shaped by her experience at the Smith College School for Social Work and its community of faculty, students and alumni. She jokes that when she began teaching at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, she would mention Smith at every faculty meeting, likely irritating her colleagues.

“I’ve never talked about a place or an institution as much as I have about Smith,” she said. Hall is currently taking steps to express her appreciation of the SCSSW* community in a concrete and permanent way, by adding a bequest to her will that will create an endowed scholarship fund.

Hall began her social work career after she served in the U.S. Army at William Beaumont Army Medical Center in Texas and at the McAfee Health Clinic in New Mexico. Her interest in the field was sparked by a maternal aunt who was a clinical social worker and by two social workers she met in the military who impressed her with their work and the support they gave her. With these women as inspiration, she enrolled in New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, where she earned a B.S.W. and an M.S.W. After completing her M.S.W., and while working on her Ph.D., Hall held a variety of positions as a social worker

and therapist. In New Mexico, she worked with New Mexico Children Youth & Families Department, a community agency serving homeless and indigent populations and as an alternative sentence planner advocating for alternatives to incarceration with the state’s public defense department.

In Little Rock, Arkansas, she was a clinician with Centers for Youth and Families and later, a psychotherapist working with chronically mentally ill adults. Hall also served as a psychotherapist in the Army Reserves after her return to civilian life, treating active duty soldiers and their family members at Bayne-Jones Army Community Hospital, Fort Polk, Louisiana and Irwin Army Community Hospital, Fort Riley, Kansas until her retirement in 2020.

Hall’s decision to pursue a doctorate in social work came from her experiences as an undergraduate and master’s student, when she had been struck by the fact that every textbook she read was centered in whiteness. “I made a promise to myself to do research that focused on African Americans, and to make a difference in the field as it related to African American women,” she recalled. It was a beloved and influential theory professor, Alice Chornesky, M.S.W. ’78, Ph.D. ’90, who inspired Hall to apply to Smith. “I think everybody in my cohort would tell you that anytime she talked about theory or practice, you just hung onto every word.

It made sense in terms of people being disenfranchised and oppressed and how we wanted to understand our clients.”

Studying at SCSSW was, in Hall’s words, “a dream come true.” As a student and later as a faculty member, Hall loved the culture of the School and she felt she could truly be herself in a way she had never experienced. She found it deeply meaningful to see herself reflected in the Black women at the School, including Ruth Simmons, who was the college president at the time, Dean Carolyn Jacobs, and former faculty members Joyce Everett, Mary Hall and Joanne Corbin. She found great support among her fellow students and remains in close contact with many of them.

Later, as an SCSSW faculty member herself, she was impressed with her students, finding them consistently hungry to learn and able to truly challenge her

*Though we often refer to Smith College School for Social Work as SSW, we use the official acronym, SCSSW, here for clarity since Hall has worked at several Schools of Social Work during her career.

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I was fortunate to have Black women nurture me; this gift allows me to leave something behind that will do the same for other people.

J. Camille Hall, Ph.D. ’04, has named SSW as a beneficiary of her life insurance to establish a scholarship to support diversity, inclusion and equity at SSW, and to support Veterans and students who work with Veterans.

intellectually. More than anything, the support and validation she experienced, and SCSSW’s dedication to diversity and anti-racism, shaped who she is as an educator, scholar and leader.

In her research as a doctoral student, Hall focused on practice interventions that could be tailored to specific groups, such as African Americans and women.

In her dissertation she explored the role of kinship ties in fostering resilience among African American adult children of alcoholics. Her research has continued in that vein; she currently focuses on risk and resilience among African

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American women, mental health, colorism and multicultural competence.

Before completing her doctorate, Hall taught in the social work schools at New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, Philander Smith College, the University of Arkansas, Little Rock and as an adjunct faculty member at SCSSW. At SCSSW, she taught a military social work practice course with Kathryn Basham for many years. Hall joined the faculty at the University of Texas (UT) in 2004, where she is now a full professor, teaching practice and research as well as a course in cultural

S M I T H COL L E G E SCHO O L FO R SO CIAL WO RK

competence that she developed for the university.

In 2020, Hall became the UT College of Social Work’s first associate dean for equity and inclusion, responsible for the strategic direction of the college’s diversity, equity and inclusion activities. Although a daunting role, she feels that her education at Smith and the School’s focus on anti-racism prepared her well for the challenge. In fact, Hall’s first impulse was to call on her SCSSW colleagues for help and guidance in the process. In August of 2020, she had Assistant Professor Peggy O’Neill, Ph.D., LCSW, lead a Critical Conversations training with the UT faculty, and they’ve since gone on to train more than 75 faculty, staff and students. She has also asked Professor Josh Miller, M.S.W., Ph.D., to be an informal mentor for her and provide consultation on pedagogy and diversity.

Hall’s endowed fund, which she is still developing with the SCSSW Office of Alumni Relations & Development, will reflect the key priorities of her career.

Taking a two-pronged approach, it will support Veterans and students who plan to work with Veterans, and will also support SCSSW’s diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, especially the recruitment of diverse students and faculty.

She is creating the fund to serve as a legacy for herself, her family and Black women, but to also inspire more Black alumni to give to the school. “I was fortunate to have Black women nurture me; this gift allows me to leave something behind that will do the same for other people,” she explained. Having thrived at SCSSW, she wants everyone to have similar opportunities: “If you just get marginalized stakeholders to the table,” she asserted, “they’ll do the rest.” ◆

Alumni News I N TH IS S ECTION

ALUMNI DESK ALUMNI LIVES

IMPACT MAKER: Dottie Brier, M.S.W. ’54, has been making an impact on the Red Cross and the people they serve for the last three decades, having served through Hurricane Andrew, Superstorm Sandy, the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11. Said Brier about her work with the Red Cross, “It’s the best job I’ve ever had and I don’t get paid for it.”

Dottie truly embodies the humanitarian spirit of the Red Cross. She has been there for our city and for our country to alleviate human suffering after some of the worst disasters in recent memory. Her compassion, especially in the field of Disaster Mental Health, has touched countless lives and given them hope to move beyond their loss.” ­­­­ —Mary Barneby, regional CEO, American Red Cross in Greater New York City

/ Alumni Desk /

DAWN M. FAUCHER Alumni Relations & Development Director

Ever Connected Reflections one year into quarantine

It will still be a while longer until we return to activities that once seemed commonplace, but I know that we will have come through with new ways to build and maintain connections.

As I sit to write this letter at the desk in my kitchen—otherwise known as my remote office—I realized it has been exactly one year since we began quarantine. In my letter to you last spring, I praised you, our amazing alums, for your swift and generous outpouring of support for the School, for our students and for one another. Today, I want to thank you all once again for your unwavering support of our School and for the many individuals, families, communities and organizations for whom your work has been essential in this most trying year.

While there have been days—mostly the snowy ones—that I have been glad to only have a commute from bedroom to kitchen, there have been many more days that I have missed climbing the stairs of Lilly Hall, sharing a laugh with fellow staff or faculty at the coffee station or traveling to visit some of you. It will still be a while longer until we return to activities that once seemed commonplace, but I know that we will have come through with new ways to build and maintain connections.

My office is working closely with Professional Education to develop more online programs and opportunities for alums. The silver lining is that these programs will now be accessible to everyone wherever they are. Similarly, I have been able to have (via Zoom) face-to-face conversations with many of you without having to wait until my travel schedule lines up with where you live. I hope that this is something that will continue. I want to hear your stories and help you connect with the people and topics that mean the most to you.

In case you are wondering, “What happened to InDepth? I don’t remember seeing a recent issue.” In 2020 we produced only one issue of the magazine which was not printed but published online. We did this to conserve resources not knowing what the pandemic would bring. We are glad to be bringing you this edition in print. If, however, you would like for us to send you future issues in digital format only, please let us know.

I wish you continued strength, hope and good health! ◆

Interested in only receiving InDepth digitally? Email us at sswalum@smith.edu.

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/ Alumni Lives /

Alumni Lives Updates from far and near 1960 Estelle Rauch writes, “Having published several novels, the last two, Sally’s Dreams and Trapped (available on Amazon), I am now working on a novel set in my winter hometown of Naples, Florida.”

1972 Glendon Muir Geikie writes, “I continue my work as an End-ofLife Doula and hospice volunteer.

I co-host a monthly Death Café and a regular Circle of Remembrance. I periodically publish articles in local news media. Check out my website: endoflifedoulaps.com or email me for more information glendon@ endoflifedoulaps.com.”

1974 Joel Kanter writes, “After relocating to our second home near Harpers Ferry WV, I’ve been busy with teletherapy and teaching online classes on the Winnicotts and Selma Fraiberg with participants from all over the world. My recent article, “Selma Fraiberg: A Life Journey in Psychoanalytic Social Work” was published in a special issue of Psychoanalytic Social Work Journal (July 2020) dedicated to Gerry Schamess and republished in Spanish translation in the initial issue of the Latin American Journal of Clinical Social Work.”

1975 Frank Donlon writes, “It’s been a very long time since I received my degree from Smith in 1975. Although I had launched my career in social work prior to coming to Smith, the M.S.W. degree and the education that I received at Smith created endless opportunities and many rich and rewarding experiences.

Overall, my career spanned just over 40 years. I’ve worked within public agencies and for private organizations, as well as in private practice.

I was employed in a variety of direct service, supervisory and administrative positions and was fortunate to have been able to retire at the age of 60, which is now over 13 years ago!

From time to time I have re-visited Smith, most recently in 2018 for the 100th anniversary celebration. It is always a rejuvenating experience that leaves me feeling refreshed and revitalized. I recently published The Accumulation of Small Advantages: A Formula for Living a Successful and

Meaningful Life which is available in paperback on Amazon. I am in the process of arranging for 100 percent of the profits from sales of the book to be donated to agencies that are involved in clinical work with children and families. I feel that it is the most logical extension of my career into my post retirement years. While I look back in amazement at how quickly the years have evaporated, I can’t have hoped for a more meaningful and important way to have spent my life.”

1980 David Aronstein writes, “I retired in 2019 from leading the Boston Alliance for Community Health. To celebrate, I spent 3 weeks in France.

Since then, I have been volunteering helping adult English Language Learners from all over the world through the International Institute of New England. Last summer I was honored with the Day-Garrett Award by Smith SSW, along with my colleague and friend, Bruce Thompson, Ph.D. whom I first met during Gary Raymond’s and my Community Service Project with the Massachusetts NASW Gay and Lesbian Task Force, in 1978. I am currently working with colleagues to develop a Virtual LGBTQ Senior Center. My husband of 15 years, Steven, and I are both looking forward to a time we can travel safely again so we can see our friends and the world.”

1981 Martin Frumkin writes “Greetings from Colorado. Before I attended SSW, I traveled extensively in Europe and Asia on the cheap for five years and kept a daily comprehensive journal. Said journal entries have morphed into a book I am about to self-publish entitled Suspected Hippie in Transit; Sex, Drugs, Rock n Roll—and search for Higher Consciousness—on the International Hippie Trail—1971– 1977 Vol 1. The complete work is over 2,000 pages, is already written and will be released in four volumes over the next year.”

1983 Carol Warner writes, “My new book, At the Feet of the Master, is a ‘spiritual fiction detailing the friendship and training of the disciple John with Jesus during the three

Ode to Our Time

BY ILGA SVECHS, CRT ’64

A tree sparrow fluffs up to the freezing cold …so still, so calm against Lake Erie’s wintry palette…

Humans immobilize to survive aggressive civic discourse begging the question…What do they mean in our time America’s small towns and farmlands brim from their radiating sun…neighbors reaching for neighbors to help, to listen, to keep the other safe…while scenes of cities’ front-line workers rush and risk lives for strangers who may heal or die with nary a touch of human hand or eye Strong echoes from sages past…James Baldwin reminds ‘The value placed on the color of skin is always and everywhere and forever a delusion.’

In the deepest recesses of our conscience and mind, we choose to live a delusion…Fighting off knowing black, brown, white or ancestry do not define our identity Gradually, relentlessly in an evolutionary spiral they stir our conscience on the ladder from equity to individuality…a steep and fragile climb Their name is strength in decency nurtured by freedom of democracy.

A sparrow ascends…

years of Jesus’ ministry on earth.’

An update of my book, Dreaming and the Journey, a look at the therapeutic journey interwoven with my own story, will be out soon.”

1985 Janet Milewski Esposito writes, “I retired in March after 35 years of being in practice. I feel grateful to have had such a wonderful career and also grateful to be starting this new chapter of my life. I am especially thankful to have more time to pursue my interests and not feel as time-pressured as I had felt for years while working full time-plus. It has certainly been a strange time in all of our lives, but I am glad the timing of my retirement was fortuitous as I have heard colleagues talk about the stress of dealing with the

pandemic in their work lives. I hope all is well with my classmates and you are all staying safe and healthy.

All the best!”

1988 Carole Geithner writes, “I just republished my book, If Only, a novel about grief and resilience, with a new, more inclusive cover.

Sadly, COVID-19 has exponentially expanded the number of grieving children and families who are having to navigate difficult conversations with peers and each other about death and remembrance, and I’ve heard from widowed parents and teachers that my book has helped to open those conversations. I am currently studying Narrative Medicine in a certificate program at Columbia University. A relatively new field,

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/ Alumni News /

Narrative Medicine teaches ‘close reading, deep listening and concentrated witnessing of works of art.’ I enjoy using those methods to facilitate writing workshops for people living with illness, people grieving a loss and teachers seeking self-care during this especially challenging era in education. If you are interested in learning more about the Narrative Medicine program offerings, which include weekly free online one-hour workshops which are attended mostly by health care and adjacent professionals, please go to narrative medicine.blog.”

1989 Rachel Michaelsen writes, “I feel fortunate that I can tolerate hours in front of my screen as I seem to be spending plenty of time providing individual psychotherapy, sound and energy healing groups and teaching a variety of topics in the field of mental health on Zoom.

I have enjoyed teaching several online classes for Smith in the last

year as well. I continue to serve as the Chair of the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology’s Humanitarian Committee. For more information about our work, check out our website: r4r.support or read about my humanitarian work: acepblog.org/2021/01/15/ideasyou-can-use-energy-psychologypractitioners-make-a-differencein-their-communities/. I continue to enjoy gardening year round in the SF Bay Area but have sadly spent too much time in the last few years contending with wildfire smoke.

Alongside my partner of 11+ years, our great project this year was working on Get Out the Vote. My other loves are a variety of fiber arts.”

1991 Shelley Brauer writes, “I am a graduate of the Ph.D. program in 1991, and was a faculty field advisor in the School for Social Work from 1990–2017. Here is a flash essay I wrote about my retirement from private practice in

IN MEMORIAM

Class of 1969

Class of 1944

Class of 1971

Ellen Horowitz Harris Class of 1946

Thelma Brodsky Lockwood Ruth Weitz Vorbach

Annette Rizzolo Letitia Nash Gerald Nurenberg John Steidl Class of 1976

Class of 1955

G. Robert Stone

Gertrude Cutler Marilyn Raab

Class of 1979

Class of 1956

Class of 1984

Rose Fidel Joanne Worley Rondestvedt

Judy Einzig Douglas MacDonald Class of 1985

Elizabeth Fleming

Joel Dansky Abigail Sawyer

Class of 1959

Class of 1986

Class of 1957

Harriet Harrison Mechanik Marot Schmitt Sterren Class of 1960

Velma Anderson Class of 1963

Josephine (Jo) Merritt Tervalon Certificate Class of 1964

Walter Long Class of 1965

Elizabeth (Betty) Habach McCollum Class of 1966

Joan Willis

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Carole Byrnes Class of 1989

Sue Carpenter Class of 1990

Emily Hoffman Class of 1991

Alfred Cramer Class of 1993

Wenda Restall Class of 2004

Jane Fisher Friends of the School

Dr. Catherine Clancy Warren Geissinger

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Boston during the pandemic: “The Click of a Mouse” “Can we have a hug at our last session?” It was a legitimate question, since we were talking about ending therapy. After 43 years as a psychotherapist, I would be retiring from the career I loved, the only thing I’d ever wanted to be when I grew up.

We dissected the meaning of a hug, all the attachments and longings encapsulated in that simple gesture.

I imagined what the final hour would be like with each of my clients I’d come to know deeply. It would be hard for me to end, as well.

Three weeks before termination, COVID-19 forced us to separate and meet in the one-dimensional space that is Zoom.

“Better than nothing,” a client said.

“At least we can see each other,” another said.

“But what about that hug?” she said. “You owe me one.” She put words to the resistance we all had to saying goodbye.

This is the way a therapy ends.

This is the way my career ends.

This is the way the relationship ends.

Not with a hug, but a mouse click.

In fact, it didn’t end. Not yet, anyway. It made more sense continuing to meet to help us all get through the pandemic, so I postponed retirement for a year. The added months of therapy have been an unexpected gift for several of my patients who’ve made good use of their reprieve!

Termination “Take Two” is scheduled for this March, and I know the essay I wrote in anticipation of the end will resonate equally the second time around.” ¾ Victor Mealy writes, “First, my prayers to all impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. I am happy to report that I retired in December 2019 from a truly satisfying career with the Fairfax-Falls Church County Community Services Board, which is the public agency delivering behavioral health, substance use and development services to twenty thousand individuals per year. I worked 34 years at the agency and held several supervisory and management positions and ultimately retired as the director of support coordination services, which is the largest developmental case management department in the commonwealth of Virginia. The department had a staff of 130 and at the time served over 4,000 individuals with a range of developmental disabilities.

I was truly honored to work with an incredibly dedicated staff who exemplified person-centered practice and worked to ensure individuals with a developmental disability had the necessary support to live their desired life in the community. My

SSW education helped me to bring a clinical focus to the delivery of case management services, which helped to enrich the depth of service delivery. Now, I am enjoying the ‘slower pace of retirement.’ I have more time to read, exercise, cook great food and look forward to spending more in-person time with family and friends and traveling after the pandemic subsides. I continue clinical work in a private group practice that specializes in serving multicultural populations, work as a field instructor with six M.S.W. interns from George Mason University, and volunteer on an exciting project at my church to stand up a youth development project serving youth in a new 72-unit low-income housing development the church just completed in Washington, DC. I am thankful for the role my SSW education has played in my professional career. My career has blessed and enriched my life and allowed me to be of service to others. I look forward to what unfolds in this phase of my journey. I would love to be in contact and you can request my email address or phone number via sswalum@smith.edu.”

1992 Nicole Christina (Reeher) writes, “I am so excited that my podcast, Zestful Aging, is now heard in 46 countries. I’ve had the chance to interview incredible women like Jean Kilbourne, Evelyn Tribole and Ashton Applewhite. I’ll also be competing in tennis at the Senior Games in Albuquerque, NM this spring. If you are in the area, please come and say hello.”

1993 Bob Gallo writes, “I recently became part of the MDMAAssisted Psychotherapy team at the Luminous Healing Center in Santa Cruz, one of the few clinics in the country offering this treatment through the Expanded Access Program under the guidance of the FDA and DEA in coordination with the Multi-disciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). Late in September 2019, I co-led a workshop for therapists about the confluence of Aikido and Psychotherapy with the Chief Instructor of Aikido of Santa Cruz. I am currently spending time with my daughter planning for college, and enjoying my son’s guitar playing and skateboard tricks.”

1998 Alison Sutton-Ryan writes, I am currently working as the director of mental health services for College of Medicine and as a clinical assistant

/ Alumni Lives /

professor in the department of psychiatry at the University of Arizona. I am also a faculty associate at Arizona State University in the M.S.W. program. I recently obtained my Doctorate of Behavioral Health from ASU. My husband, Erik, and I have enjoyed over 23 years of marriage. Our daughter is in her second year at Emerson College, our son is a high school senior and they keep busy in quarantine with their four rescue dogs.”

2009 Caitlin Cotter writes, “In January 2021, I moved from Seattle to Benicia, CA with my husband, almost 3-year-old and 2 cats in search of more sun! I also launched a telehealth psychotherapy practice serving both Washington and California. I am looking forward to long walks on the beach with Michelle Marlowe ’09 and connecting with all the other Bay Area Smithies. For more info on my practice see: innerbeing psychotherapy.com.”

2012 Juliette Kennedy writes, “Since graduating from SSW in 2012 I have worked at the Center for Urban Community Services in New

York City. I have had the pleasure of supervising several Smith interns and new social workers over the years. I recently left my agency position to transition into private practice. I specialize in working with women experiencing infertility and postpartum mood and anxiety disorders. I am currently attending the two year postgraduate program at the Women’s Therapy Centre Institute in New York. My husband and I welcomed our son, Seamus, in 2017.”

2013 Bronwyn Shiffer writes, “I enjoy living in Madison, WI where I own a private practice providing therapy to Highly Sensitive women struggling with depression.”

2016 Mariel Stadick writes, “My husband Mikhail and I joyfully welcomed our twins, Jakob and Lukas, in June! I have now resumed seeing children and adults in private practice in Baltimore, MD. Amid all the intensity of new parenthood, my colleague Dr. Aleisa Myles and I managed to complete a paper that’s been a passion project of ours for the past few years titled “Childism and Magnarchy: Making

Conscious the Power of Liberatory Play in Psychoanalysis,” which will be published in an upcoming issue of Journal for the Advancement of Scientific Psychoanalytic Empirical Research (JASPER). We hope to continue to explore how the practice of play therapy can align with antichildism work.”

2018 Lucie-Ann Chen writes, “I am excited to share that I have been selected for the 2021 cohort of the University of Chicago Civic Leadership Academy based at the Center for Effective Government and the Harris School of Public Policy. CLA brings together an annual cohort of 30 high-potential leaders of nonprofit organizations and government agencies that serve residents and communities across the city of Chicago and Cook County.

Fellows engage in six months of leadership development programming and instruction with renowned University of Chicago faculty and network with practitioners from across the city—all in the service of developing individual leaders who will create meaningful change in the city of Chicago. I look forward to partnering with colleagues across sectors to grow in our leadership

and advance meaningful reform in Chicago.” ¾ Maddie Freeman writes, “I started a new job after reaching LICSW licensure. I am starting as a Psychotherapist in a psychodynamic and relational group practice out of Harvard Square and Back Bay, MA. This feels like a really big change of pace, after having been in fast-paced / team-based medical settings until now. I continue to love groups, and I am the co-editor of the Northeastern Society for Group Psychotherapy’s (NSGP) online newsletter, called NSGPeople.”

2019 Shanna Fishel writes, “I am running for Mayor of Northampton, MA, in the fall 2021 municipal election! Our current Mayor, David Narkewicz, is not seeking reelection, clearing the way for new leadership in government. With my background in education and social work I am excited to bring humane, compassionate and justice-oriented practices to city management. Having overcome personal obstacles and supported others to overcome theirs, I intend to lead Northampton’s efforts towards growth and transformative policies.

To learn more about my platform, and to support the campaign, visit: shannafishel.com.”

Obituaries InDepth runs obituaries that are submitted by family, friends or classmates. Please submit obituaries to indepth@smith.edu or to InDepth, Smith College School for Social Work, Northampton, MA 01063.

InDepth obituaries are 100-word notices for the alumni community and are not intended to repeat all of the information contained in newspaper obituaries.

Velma Mildred Anderson, M.S.W. ’60

Elizabeth (Betty) Habach McCollum, M.S.W. ’65

Born in New York to Trinidadian immigrants, Velma attended Hunter College before earning her master’s degree from Smith. Later, she moved to Los Angeles where she had a long career, retiring in 1993 after 25 years as director of clinical social work at USC Medical Center. Well known for her charity, Velma supported many health and education organizations and was active in the California Democratic Party and the American Public Health Association (APHA).

Betty died at age 79 from COVID-19. A proud Smithie, Betty completed fieldwork in Denver, CO and Rochester, NY at Strong Memorial Hospital. She made her career in Rochester first working at Hillside Children’s Center, a residential treatment facility, and later as a school social worker in Fairport.

In retirement, Betty maintained an active private practice and, in 2003, moved to Manhattan. Active in the NYC Smith Book Club and on the Smith College Club of NYC board, Betty cultivated many friendships across the Smith community. She will be dearly missed.

January 4, 2020

Dr. Catherine Clancy December 31, 2020

A revered teacher, colleague and mentor, Dr. Clancy spent her career in the Houston medical community, retiring from the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center as the social work training director where she guided and supervised social work students from eight social work schools from across the country. Dr. Clancy taught at University of Houston, Baylor College of Medicine, University of Texas and Smith SSW. She received several awards and honors throughout her career, but most meaningful was Smith’s DayGarrett Award for outstanding contribution to the social work profession and the Smith educational community.

April 21, 2020

Josephine Merritt Cunningham Tervalon, M.S.W. ’63 December 18, 2020

Jo came to Smith from Tuskegee University where she proudly graduated with honors and was crowned Miss Tuskegee. In her 43 years of private practice Jo not only provided transformative healing but also taught and mentored many other clinicians. Throughout her storied career she was a valued member of the NASW, AGPA, Southwestern Group Psychotherapy Society, San Antonio Group Psychotherapy Society and Houston Group Psychotherapy Society. She was prolific in publications and presentations.

Her list of accolades long—including Smith’s Day-Garrett Award. She leaves beloved husband Albert, cherished family and friends.

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/ Post Script /

Pet-a-Pet Day Knowing our students won’t return to campus until 2022, we’re feeling nostalgic for our summers on campus and traditions like Pet-a-Pet Day. As we all find ways to stay connected virtually this summer, let’s remember we’ll be back to celebrating traditions— big and small—next summer.

Save the date for our Grand Commencement Ceremony celebrating the classes of 2020, 2021 and 2022 the weekend of August 19, 2022.

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S M I T H COL L E G E SCHO O L FO R SO CIAL WO RK

Go Beyond Traditional Practice with Smith SSW Professional Education The careers that create meaningful, lasting change in people’s lives are led by professionals who all share a determination that routinely takes them above and beyond. And you can find those individuals in the professional education programs of Smith College School for Social Work. Here you’ll find a community that recharges you in ways that go beyond networking, programs that transform careers and a commitment to greater justice and anti-racism.

Smith College School for Social Work Professional Education is where the best thinkers come together to tackle the relevant issues in clinical social work today.

A SAMPLING OF RECENT AND UPCOMING EVENTS Aug. 9 Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for Depressive Disorders Among Adults 3 CEs Aug. 13 Impacts of the Pandemic on Children and Adolescents: Supporting Students Return to In-Person Learning 3 CEs Sept. 10, 17 & 24 From Surviving to Thriving through Healing: Treatment Considerations for Race-Based Traumatic Stress 9 CEs Sept. 21 & 28 Introduction to Financial Social Work with Adults 6 CEs Sept. 27 Therapeutic Goals and Challenges of Working with Young Adults with Emerging Serious Mental Illness 3 CEs

CERTIFICATE IN PALLIATIVE AND END-OF-LIFE CARE Session I: November 4–7, 2021 | Session II: May 5–8, 2022 Application Deadline: August 15 Up to 45 CEs available

ssw.smith.edu/PE

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In a time of crisis, go beyond.

Smith College School for Social Work offers programs that surpass the traditional.

Our low-residency M.S.W. and Ph.D. programs alternate concentrated periods of rigorous on-campus education in Northampton with off-site training at leading clinical or research sites around the country.

Our post-graduate Professional Education offerings take it a step further, keeping you on the cutting edge of clinical social work through a variety of online coursework designed to fit your schedule and the “new normal.”

Learn more about Smith SSW and go beyond traditional practice today.

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M.S.W./Ph.D.

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APPLICATION DEADLINES M.S.W. Early Decision: January 5 M.S.W. Regular Decision: February 21 Ph.D. Deadline: February 1

Advanced Standing

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Professional Education

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Clinical Research Institute