News: Alumni and community

We found our alumni and community continually making news in 2020 and 2021

State and VCU recognition

Unsung and excellent

Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring honored alumni Ian Danielsen (M.S.W.’92/SW), LCSW, and Kim Flournoy DiJoseph (B.S.W.’05/SW; M.S.W.’08/SW) and nine others as recipients of 2021 Unsung Heroes Award during National Crime Victims’ Rights Week. More details

As part of its annual Excellence in Virginia Government Awards, VCU’s Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs recognized two social work alumni. John Purnell (M.S.W.’64/SW; M.P.A.’78/GPA) received the 2021 Grace E. Harris Leadership Award, while Health Brigade executive director Karen Legato (M.S.W.’95/SW) accepted the Community Enhancement Award on behalf of her agency. More details

Top 10 ranking

VCU’s Alumni Association honored alum Stephanie Lynch (B.S.’10/H&S; M.S.W.’13/SW) with one of its 10 Under 10 Awards in 2020. Lynch has been a member of the Richmond City Council since 2019, but says she remains, at heart “a classic social worker, a policy practitioner.” More details

Serving sickle cell patients

Alumni – and current M.S.W. students – Corey Cruppenink (B.A.’09/GPA; B.S.W.’19/SW) and Isabella Kitzmann (B.S.W.’21/SW) are practicing social workers with VCU Health, getting their start with undergraduate field placements there assisting with care for patients with sickle cell disease.

As students, they helped ensure patient access to care and consistent treatment plans, referred patients to occupational therapy or life skills training, and even helped pediatric patients apply to trade school or for college financial aid. “I found what I want to do for the rest of my life,” Cruppenink says. More details

From votes to sneakers

Alum Marc Cheatham (B.S.W.’05/SW), director of constituent services and casework for Sen. Tim Kaine, showed his versatility with two VCU Alumni Association events. First, in 2020, he participated on a panel called “The Right to Vote: Election Integrity and Advocacy”; in 2021, Cheatham’s pop culture presentation was on “Sneaker Madness.” He runs The Cheats Movement, a website focused on hip-hop, culture, politics and community.

School and community recognition

Impacting Richmond and Petersburg

The Richmond Times-Dispatch named Jeanine Harper Maruca (B.S.W.’86/SW; M.S.W.’93/SW) one of its 2020 People of the Year. She has been executive director since 2000 of Greater Richmond SCAN (Stop Child Abuse Now), which works on prevention and treatment of child abuse and neglect. She is also a 2019 winner of VCU’s Alumni Star award. More details

Vanessa Crawford (B.S.’74/SW), sheriff of the city of Petersburg, was named a 2021 Remarkable Woman for Central Virginia. Crawford designated the Alzheimer's Association to receive the award’s $1,000 gift. More details

Local leadership

Alum Lashawnda Singleton (B.S.W.’14/SW) is serving as the 2021 president of the Richmond Chapter of the National Association of Black Social Workers. More details

Alum Kevin Holder (M.S.W.’05/SW) has been president since 2019 of the Phi Beta Sigma fraternity’s Richmond alumni chapter, Iota Sigma. More details

21 Under 40

We’ll never know how many more social work alumni would have made Style Weekly’s annual 40 Under 40 Awards now that the magazine ceased publishing in early September 2021. But in the previous 17 years, 21 graduates were selected – including six of the 40 in 2020. At least one alum was selected in six consecutive years and 13 of the previous 14.

“I’m not at all surprised” about the number of social work alumni, says Nicole O-Pries (M.S.W.’04/SW), LCSW, an associate professor in teaching at the School of Social Work and a 40U40 selection in 2010. More details

Collective 365

Alumni Allison Gilbreath (B.S.’11/GPA; M.S.W.’16/SW), Abbey Philips (B.A.’09/H&S; M.S.W.’12/SW) and Fatima M. Smith (M.S.W.’12/SW) founded the nonprofit Collective 365 in 2020 and a year later awarded $17,500 in grants to seven organizations as they support and empower Black and Brown communities. Their goal for 2022? $35,000 in grants. More details

Office of Field Education awards

Congratulations to the 2021 School of Social Work’s Office of Field Education award winners:

Amy Rosenblum Award: alum Amy Strite (M.S.W.’90/SW), CEO of Voices for Virginia’s Children
Task Supervisor of the Year: alum Gary “Trey” Taylor (B.S.’11/H&S), LCSW, therapist, speaker, author, consultant, facilitator
Field Liaison of the Year: alum Shenita Williams (B.S.W.’93/SW; M.S.W’95/SW), LCSW, LPC, clinical social worker, adjunct instructor with the school
Outstanding Field Instructors: alum Jacob Snow (B.S.W.’12/SW), program manager of homeless services at Catholic Community Charities; Susan Gardner, LCSW, clinical social worker/therapist
Community Partner of the Year: Robin’s Hope, founded by alum Jennifer Kell (M.S.W.’96/SW), LCSW
Office of Field Education Star: Jillian Carpenter (M.S.W.’14/SW), assistant professor of teaching and faculty field liaison at the School of Social Work

National recognition

Social Work Today cover story

Alumni Allison Gilbreath (B.S.’11/GPA; M.S.W.’16/SW) and Naomi Sutton Reddish (B.A.’05/H&S; M.S.W.’09/SW) co-authored “Caught in the Middle: The Plight of Crossover Youth,” the winter 2021 edition cover story for Social Work Today. The article focused on the intersection of youth who have spent time in both the child welfare and juvenile justice systems. Gilbreath is a policy and programs director at Voices for Virginia’s Children, and Reddish is the coordinator of the School of Social Work’s Child Welfare Stipend Program. More details

Featured in Time, Harper’s Bazaar magazines

Alum Chelsea Higgs Wise (M.S.W. ’12/SW) was quoted in Time magazine in 2020 about the Robert E. Lee statue and other Confederate monuments in Richmond, and alternatives that would honor activists and change agents. More details

Alum Michaela Hatton (B.S.W.’20/SW) was at the center of protests in Richmond in the summer of 2020 as a community organizer and reflected on the experience with an essay featured in Harper’s Bazaar magazine. More details

Community impact, from Louisiana to Michigan

Alum Rhonda M. Jackson (M.S.W.’94/SW), LMSW, is participating in a three-year $432,000 grant through New Orleans’ emPOWER NOLA program to develop interventions that heal and support children living with trauma. More details

Alum Sara Van Tongeren (M.S.W.’08/SW) and two colleagues were honored in 2021 with social justice awards by the city of Holland, Michigan, for their advocacy in supporting a nondiscrimination ordinance. More details

Disability rights champion

Alum Hannah Setzer (M.S.W.’16/SW) stays busy running a business and parenting four children with her husband. But her passion is advocating for disability rights, specifically an accessible playground and a community center in Powhatan, Virginia. “People with disabilities don’t have to be hidden away at home,” she tells The Washington Post. More details

Social media shoutouts

Twice in 2021, the Institute for Child Welfare Innovation used its social media platforms to highlight alum Andrea Perez (M.S.W.’20/SW) for her work with the Albemarle County (Virginia) Department of Social Services. Perez, a VCU Child Welfare Stipend Program graduate, was praised for participating in ICWI’s #10thousandlives promotion to connect more children in foster care to their families.