/ SSWorks /
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.
B Y ME G A N R U B IN E R Z IN N
/ 12 /
S M I T H COL L E G E SCHO O L FO R SO CIAL WO RK
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
