Collective 365, with 3 social work alumnae, empowers Black, Brown communities with grants
With three VCU School of Social Work alumni among its 11 founders, it’s no wonder that the nonprofit Collective 365 has ambitious plans after selecting recipients for its inaugural grant cycle of $17,500 earlier this year. Next in their sights: doubling their awards with a $35,000 grant cycle in February. “With $35,000 as our goal, […]
Lineberry’s Champions of Accessibility Award highlights a banner year for Ph.D. Program
The news that Ph.D. student Sarah Lineberry has been named a winner of VCU’s Champions of Accessibility Award for 2021 capped a notable academic year for her and her colleagues in the School of Social Work doctoral program. Lineberry was one of nine winners university-wide and one of only two students to earn the champions […]
M.S.W. Program Director Melissa Stewart retiring after 21 years with school
Melissa Stewart, Ph.D., is happy she will get a chance to participate in one final VCU School of Social Work Commencement ceremony, after the 2020 event was switched from in-person to virtual because of COVID-19. With the return of an in-person ceremony in 2021, Stewart will be able to say one last goodbye – albeit […]
Substance and style: You can expect one – or more – VCU social work alumni to be on this list almost every year
Style Weekly’s Top 40 Under 40 awards is not only an annual cover-story edition for the Richmond magazine, it has also served as a kind of reunion for VCU School of Social Work alumni. From the origins of the award in 2004 to the most recent honors last fall, VCU social work graduates have been […]
Meet the Smiths: An oft-delayed college experience puts mother, daughter in same M.S.W. cohort
Two-and-a-half decades after problems with her pregnancy delayed Felicia Smith’s second attempt at college, she is in the second semester of the M.S.W. Program at VCU’s School of Social Work. She graduated from the B.S.W. Program in May 2020, serving as the program’s student speaker at Commencement. She is the current president of the Association […]
Beth Angell’s origin story: From first-generation student to social work dean
Beth Angell’s social work story actually starts with a chapter focused on psychology. “I have to admit that I had never met a social worker or understood what one was until I was in college,” says Angell, Ph.D., who became dean of the VCU School of Social Work in the summer of 2018. SOCIAL WORK […]
Rothenberg, Harris: Pioneering social work deans who smashed the glass ceiling
As the new VCU School of Social Work dean prepared to start her job, she took stock of several key challenges. SOCIAL WORK MONTH: 2021: ORIGIN STORIES How could the program work more collaboratively with other academic units to offer more educational opportunities that cut across related disciplines? How could the school provide better access […]
Study: For those on psychiatric medication, family caregivers can be valuable resource
VCU School of Social Work Professor Kia J. Bentley, Ph.D., LCSW, has spent 35 years conducting research around how the social work field can be responsive to client and family dilemmas centered around the use of psychiatric medication. But it was only with a recent study, published in Community Mental Health Journal, that she took […]
‘A beautiful moment’: Social work alum honored for nondiscrimination advocacy in Michigan
VCU social work alum Sara Van Tongeren, Rev. Jennifer Adams and Jeffrey Sorenson received social justice awards from the city of Holland, Michigan, in January. For VCU School of Social Work alum Sara Van Tongeren (M.S.W.’08/SW), a “surreal” seven-hour city council meeting in August 2020 was delayed gratification for the passage of a long-awaited nondiscrimination […]
‘Oh my, I got a scholarship!’ Fostering Success supports child welfare focus
Originally published in VCU’s December 2020 Impact magazine. Ebony Mack (M.S.W.’18/SW) couldn’t help but exclaim. She had just received an email, in 2017, naming her the first recipient of the VCU School of Social Work’s Fostering Success Scholarship. “I think I was at work, and it came through. ‘Oh my, I got a scholarship!’ I […]