Position
Academic Background
Sample Courses
Teaching Philosophy
Research & Interests
Notable Academic Appointments & Awards
Selected Scholarly Presentations

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Position            

• Assistant Professor of Social Work

Academic Background         

• Adelphi University - D.S.W. Social Work, 1996
• Adelphi University - M.S.W. Social Work, 1992
• St. Joseph's University - B.S. Sociology, 1977

Sample Courses Taught at Providence College   

• Human Behavior and Social Systems
• Social Policy
• Community and Political Practice
• Theory Practice Seminar
• Introduction to Human Services

Teaching Philosophy            

Since professional social workers are constantly faced with different contexts and new problems, I consider it vital that my students learn how to think critically and creatively in addition to mastering principles of human behavior and social intervention. I am in favor of the dialectical process of challenging one's own hypotheses in order to eventually synthesize the best parts of both sides of every human and social dilemma. Some students just want me to tell what they need to know to get an A, but I try to show them that they have a moral responsibility to learn how to think in order to serve their clients in the real world.

Research & Interests                

What fires me up is exchanging social workers between the US and other countries so we can learn from each other. PC has received a grant to build an international social work practice model for work with children and youth. Through this we will be one of only three US schools who’ll exchange students and faculty with European Union schools for a semester. This type of program will broaden students’ perspective from a local and national level to one that is international and global. It will introduce them to new ways of answering social problems.In addition, I have studied and am continuing to study different approaches to child care services in various cultures with particlar regard to how these approaches effect social competency and autonomy. Currently I am studying Native American, Mexican, Danish, Belgian and US child care practices.

Notable Academic Appointments and Awards

• 1999 - Present: Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families;
  Child Welfare Institute Program and Training Design Group, Providence, RI
• 2004 - Present: Principal Investigator for Transatlantic Alliance for Creating a New Social Services Practice, an initiative of the United States Department of Education and European Union Commission of Education. This is a three-year funded project to exchange faculty and students from three US colleges with three EU colleges, and to build an international social work practice model.
• 2003 - 2004: Principal Investigator for Social Revitalization in Smith Hill, an oral history as a community needs assessment model. Research funded by Providence College 2003/4 CAFR grant for the Smith  Hill Community Development Corporation.
• 1999 - 2004: Principal Investigator for Child Day Care Services: Conflicting Values and Priorities for Child Development. Research funded by Providence College 2002/3 CAFR grant for the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth, and Families.

Selected Scholarly Presentations and Activities

• "Innovative International Exchange Program Among European Union and United States BSW Students" -- Presentation at the 23rd Annual Conference of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, November 2005.
• "Faculty and Student Collaborative Research: Family Centered Practice in Child Welfare" --Presentation at the 23rd Annual Conference of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, November 2005.
• Teaching Improvisation: The Struggle for a Social Work Aesthetic -- Roundtable Discussion at the 23rd Annual Conference of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, November 2005.
• "Faculty and Student Collaborative Research: Attachment and Prosociability as a Function of Day Care" -- Presentation at the 22nd Annual Conference of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, November 2004.
• "Marketing Social Work: Meanings, Signs, and Entrepreneurship" -- Presentation at the 22nd Annual Conference of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, November 2004.
• "Child Development" -- Three-day workshop presentation for Rhode Island Department of Children Youth and Families employees, May 2003; September 2003, May 2004, May 2005.
• 2003-2004: Faculty/Student Collaborative Research--Social Revitalization in Smith Hill: Oral history as a community needs assessment model.  Principal Investigator: Providence College 2003-4 CAFR grant funded research investigation for the Smith Hill Community Development Corporation
• 2001-2004: Faculty/Student Collaborative Research--"The Relation of Center-Based Day Care Quality to Attachment and Prosociability in Day Care." Principal Investigator for research conducted with the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth, and Families assessing the quality of day care in Rhode Island state licensed child day care centers                                  

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