Dean's Corner | December Issue: On community, learning, and care
Dear CSSW Community,
Since the start of the semester, we have all been thinking intentionally about how to contribute to the community we are building at CSSW. In just a few short months, I have seen that commitment come to life in powerful and meaningful ways. You have organized a food drive to support one another during a time of uncertainty. You have created spaces for connection and stress relief, including a wall filled with words of encouragement. You have shown up as advocates for one another and for the Harlem community more broadly. These acts reflect care, solidarity, and a deep sense of responsibility to one another.
While the newspaper headlines have not gotten any better, we gather strength from one another. We do this in spite of the painful events all around us. This is the power of community. Building community also means creating space for honesty, accountability, and repair. The need to repair is not an indication of a failure of community; in fact, it is one of its most essential practices. Furthermore, we know that centering the impact of our actions, even when intent is good, is also foundational to trust and belonging.
Being in community calls us to approach one another with generosity and good faith. None of us arrives in this work fully formed, and none of us builds meaningful change alone. As a learning institution, we are committed to growth: learning from missteps, adjusting when new knowledge, science, or community insight calls us forward, and continuing to do difficult and innovative work even when the path is not perfectly clear. That kind of courage inevitably includes mistakes. What matters most is how we respond to them. It’s best we do so with humility, curiosity, and a commitment to repair in order to remain in community.
As we head into winter break, let’s all reflect on the kind of community we want to sustain. A community that does not fear mistakes, or shame those who have made mistakes. Instead let's embrace mistakes for what they are: a necessary part of our learning. My hope is that with this mindset we will enter difficult conversations with the goal of repair and not condemnation. We want to meet moments of hurt with care, accountability, and a shared desire to move forward, together.
This community has suffered great loss over the past year. Top of mind are the wonderful friends and colleagues we are missing – Pinto, Ashley, Max, and JJ – all beautiful human beings who had so much more to share with the world. This is an enormous loss, without a doubt; and at the same time, we have the opportunity to carry their light forward. Both are true, and we can choose to lean into the duality over the binary.
I am deeply grateful to be in community with you. May the weeks ahead offer you rest, renewal, and time to reconnect with what brings you joy.
With appreciation and warm wishes for this community,
Melissa
COMMUNITY UPDATES:
Several of our colleagues will be retiring at the end of this month. All have dedicated decades to CSSW and to our research and teaching mission. Please join me in thanking them for their contributions and wishing them great joy and fulfillment in the next phase of life and career!
Dr. Ronald Feldman joined the faculty of CSSW in 1985 and became Dean in 1986, after serving on the faculty at the University of California at Berkeley and the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. Among his main scholarly and teaching interests are adolescent mental health, youth development, group work practice, and contemporary professional education. Dr. Feldman received his BA in Psychology from SUNY Buffalo, his MSW from the University of Michigan, and his PhD in Social Work and Sociology from the University of Michigan. He was appointed as the Ruth Harris Ottman Centennial Professor for the Advancement of Social Work Education in 1995. During his CSSW deanship, Dr. Feldman served us at a critical time, establishing a number of new endowed professorships, and raising substantial funds to build our beautiful new building at the corner of Amsterdam Avenue and West 122nd Street. Dr. Feldman has been a leader in our field, as recognized by his designation as a Fulbright Lecturer at the Social Services Academy in Ankara, Turkey; a Resident Fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation Study Center in Bellagio, Italy; and a recipient of the Distinguished Career Achievement Award conferred by the Society for Social Work and Research.
Dr. Louisa Gilbert is a licensed social worker with over 25 years of experience developing, implementing, evaluating and disseminating multilevel interventions to address gender-based violence (GBV), HIV/AIDS, substance misuse, opioid overdose, and trauma among key affected communities. She holds a BA from Barnard College, and an MS, MPhil, and PhD from the Columbia School of Social Work. Her research has advanced evidence-based computerized GBV prevention models that have been integrated into a continuum of HIV prevention, testing, and treatment interventions. She has served as a co-director of the Social Intervention Group (SIG) since 1999 and co-founder and co-director of the Global Health Research Center of Central Asia (GHRCCA) since 2007. Dr. Gilbert’s research has concentrated on developing and evaluating the effectiveness of implementing a continuum of evidence-based interventions to prevent intimate partner violence and other types of GBV among migrant women, women who use drugs, and women in the criminal justice system. These interventions are now being implemented in a range of organizations in the United States, India, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Indonesia, Uzbekistan, and Kenya.
Dr. Ada Chan Yuk-Sim Mui is a world-renowned social gerontologist in cross-cultural research. Her current focus is on dementia caregiving and on the validation of dementia screening instruments among community-dwelling older Chinese and Chinese American populations in New York City and globally. She holds a PhD from Washington University in St. Louis, and has extensive practice experience with older adults in Hong Kong and the United States. Her research interests include international gerontology, productive aging, older volunteers, age-friendly communities, self-care, family caregiving, medical care, community-based long-term care, psychological well-being, depression, religiosity, immigration, and acculturation experiences among older populations. Dr. Mui’s awards and recognitions include a Fulbright Scholarship, the Fulbright Senior Specialist Award, the Busse Research Award from the Pan American Congress on Gerontology, and the Outstanding Mentorship Award from the Gerontological Society of America. Dr. Mui is also an honorary professor at Beijing Normal University, Beijing Youth Politics College, and the University of Hong Kong, China. She previously served as a fellow at the Sau Po Center on Aging at the University of Hong Kong.
Our faculty and staff colleagues are continuing to lead the profession and work on some of the most vital issues that impact well-being, including access to health care, affordability, combating racism, and advancing social work education. You can read about some of their work via the links below:
Please join me in congratulating Dr. Heidi Allen on her promotion to Professor of Social Work as of January 1st, 2026. She and PhD candidate Scarlett Wang have recently published an editorial on health care affordability in The Milbank Quarterly.
Dr. Nkemka Anyiwo and colleagues have published a new paper in the American Psychologist entitled “None but Ourselves Can Free Our Minds”: Toward a Theory of Collective Black Consciousness.
Colleagues from the Poverty Center, in collaboration with Robin Hood, have published a new study on food budget affordability of New Yorkers; their work has also been reported by the New York Times.
Dr. Warren Graham, Associate Dean for Practicum Learning, has a forthcoming paper to appear in the Journal of Social Work Education on Practice Behaviors for the 2022 EPAS’ Practicum Education Using an ADEI Framework.
The AI for Social Good and Society Initiative at SIG is launching a new University Seminar exploring how artificial intelligence can be developed, implemented, and governed to advance equity, accountability and the public good. You can read more about it here.
As many of you know, regulations around federal student loans are changing significantly. We are carefully tracking these developments. If you wish to read more about this issue, please visit this page on the NASW website with details.