Christine D. Holmes

Dr. Christine Holmes is an adjunct lecturer at the Columbia School of Social Work, and has enjoyed working with the online program since 2018. Her areas of interest bridge aging and international social work. Christine is the founder and counselor of Hand in Hand Caregiver Counseling, supporting long distance caregivers of older adults through caregiving, loss and grief. She is also an alum of the American Society on Aging’s RISE fellowship program, which develops leadership in BIPOC professionals in aging. 

Christine’s clinical practice began at The New York Foundling where she delivered home-based family therapy in the South Bronx before supporting justice-involved families as a case manager for the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services. Christine discovered her passion for family caregiving as a case manager for the D.C. Superior Court’s Guardianship Assistance Program. Afterward, she provided distance counseling to caregivers of parents living with Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Dementias for the NYU Caregiver Intervention study.

Christine has served internationally in various capacities, including her role as a course facilitator for the Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative in Jakarta, Indonesia. Previously, she was visiting faculty for The Banyan Academy of Leadership in Mental Health, an academic institution of The Banyan, a mental health and homelessness NGO in Chennai, India. She developed an operations manual and a diploma course for homeless shelter coordinators, and led research on the history of colonial psychiatry in Kerala, India. Christine was also a regional teacher trainer for the Peace Corps in Cambodia, and provided capacity building to the Harpswell Foundation, the Youth with Disabilities Foundation for Education and Employment and the Royal University of Phnom Penh.

Christine earned her Doctor of Clinical Social Work degree at the University of Pennsylvania where she was honored with the Dr. Ram Cnaan Award for merit. Christine holds a Master of Science in Social Work from the Columbia School of Social Work, a Bachelor of Science in Social Work from Arizona State University and an Associate of Arts degree in General Studies from Glendale Community College.