Letter from Dean Nina Heller

Dear Alumni Colleagues,

I am writing with news of your School of Social Work. First, I hope you are all well – this has been an enormously challenging year for so many of us and certainly for the people and communities we serve. If ever there were a time for social work, this is it. We’ve dealt with the twin pandemics of covid-19 and structural racism. The school has been addressing these issues in a number of ways.

As you know, the pandemic has disproportionately affected underserved communities. We quickly responded last summer with the development of several new field placements units that provide covid-related assistance to local agencies and their clients. We are working with the CT Department of Public Health to provide telephone outreach for contact tracing and outreach to older adults who are isolated due to covid related restrictions. We are also working closely with the Hartford Public Schools where we have placed more than 20 MSW students to work with students, families, and staff on covid related school access and inclusion efforts. In that setting, we also provide online training jointly to field instructors and students. These field units are a model that we will want to continue post-pandemic.

We have also developed a robust collection of anti-racism resources – trainings, webinars, readings, as we continue our efforts to address the history, legacy, and solutions to structural forms of racism. These are available on the SSW website.

The “classroom” has also been transformed. Nearly a year ago, we made a rapid pivot to online delivery of our curriculum. I commend our faculty and students for their patience, perseverance, and success in quickly adapting to the online environment. We have continued this modality through this academic year with only a handful of classes being delivered in person or in a hybrid model. The technologies allow faculty and students to learn through lectures, break out groups, and discussion boards. Here to, we have valuable lessons learned and will likely continue some of the more successful advances in emerging pedagogy.

We have recently embarked on the SSW Strategic Planning Process. We are focusing on several areas; diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism; field education; research and scholarship; emerging areas of need and focus; and the future of teaching and learning. We know that social work education is life-transformative and we want to continue to carry out our mission of excellence in producing innovative and committed practitioners and critical social work knowledge in research, both of which are enhanced by our robust collaborations with community and state agencies.

I am most appreciative to the increasing role that alumni have played in the life and energy of the school.  Our Alumni Director has recently formed the SSW Board of Champions, a group of committed and energetic faculty, representing over 40 years of classes. You will be hearing from this group as they have ideas about how to engage you all in the activities of the school and the many ways that you can support the SSW and we can reach out to you.

You, as alumni, are both the legacy and the future of the school of social work. Please feel free to reach out to us through alumni affairs, sign up for a continuing education program, or attend one of our public lectures or events. If you are considering advanced education, our PhD program is in its 19th year and is a great opportunity to prepare for faculty and research roles.

Sincerely,

Nina Rovinelli Heller PhD, Dean

Zachs Professor