2023 Awardees

Director, Gamble Skogmo Endowed Chair and Associate Professor, University of Minnesota – Twin Cities

The 2023 Established Faculty Service and Leadership in Social Work Education Award is presented to Joan M. Blakey,  Director, Gamble Skogmo Endowed Chair, and a tenured Associate Professor in the School of Social Work at the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities.

Dr. Blakey has benefited from or served in leadership roles at CSWE for almost 14 years. Her leadership development in higher education began as a CSWE Minority Fellowship Program (MFP) fellow. She has held three leadership roles within CSWE. She served on the Council on Practice Methods and Specialization, as Commissioner on the Commission on Membership and Professional Development, and as a CSWE board member as the Graduate Faculty Representative. She was a chair for the Criminal and Juvenile Justice APM track. She has reviewed applications for the MFP Master's program for several years. Additionally, she has served as a Graduate Program reviewer for two MSW programs. In addition, Dr. Blakey is a Board Member of the Black Administrators, Researchers, and Scholars (BARS) organization established by Dr. Larry Davis.

Dr. Blakey has mentored 33 Doctorate of Social Work (DSW) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) students by serving on their advanced practice projects and dissertation committees. She served as a graduate research advisor to nine students and was the research advisor for six masters and 12 undergraduates. Dr. Blakey has worked with almost 70 students, been an external reviewer for eight Assistant Professors, and mentored many assistant professors through tenure and promotion.

Dr. Blakey’s research agenda primarily focuses on two main areas. The first area is to help more effectively serve Black women with histories of substance abuse, often resulting from complex trauma, who become involved with the child protection and criminal justice system. She has sought to understand the prevalence of trauma among women involved with these systems, the process of healing from trauma, and what trauma-informed systems of care look like to serve this population effectively. 

Dr. Blakey’s second area of focus is diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racist and anti-oppressive practice. As an equity consultant, Dr. Blakey works with organizations to assess their readiness for change and provide expert guidance, direction, and advice on existing policies, procedures, practices, and strategies using an equity lens. She also develops work plans, organizes training, and identifies strategies to improve racial climates. Her work consistently has been about transforming systems to recognize and embrace peoples' full humanity to create and foster environments where all individuals can excel and thrive. 

Blakey received her doctorate from the University of Chicago’s School of Social Service Administration. She also attended the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities, receiving her Bachelor of Science in African American Studies, Sociology, and Youth Studies and a Master of Social Work degree. 
 

The Significant Lifetime Achievement in Social Work Education Award is presented to Edith Fraser, MSW, PhD, a retired adjunct professor who taught for more than 37 years at Oakwood University, Alabama A & M and Smith College School for Social Work.

While at Oakwood University (formerly Oakwood College), Dr. Fraser served in several capacities: Director of Field Instruction, Chair of Social Work Department and had a dual appointment as professor in Social Work Department and Director of Faculty Development and Research. At Smith College School for Social Work, she was an adjunct professor for over 20 years and Bertha Reynolds Senior Fellow providing guidance for faculty and students on issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. During her tenure at Alabama A & M, she was Chair of the Social Work and Psychology Department.

Dr. Fraser has taught undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students. She has a passion for teaching and her students recognize her knowledge, fervor, and innovative pedagogical approaches. Her proudest moments are seeing her many students making a difference in the lives of vulnerable populations, in social work education, in research and in the Social Work profession. 

She has a long history of Community Service and Service to the profession: she has served as a site visitor for CSWE; Chair of local NASW; Vice-President for State Board of NASW (2003–2005); CSWE commission on Accreditation (2007–2012) and NASW Credentialing Committee member (2020–present). She has been a board member for Catholic Family Services, Catholic Center for Concern, Aids Action Coalition, Women’s Advisory Board UAH, Homicide Survivor Program, International Services/Global Ties, Madison County Commission for Healthy Marriages, and American Red Cross.   

Her international experience includes being selected as a Fulbright Scholar in Egypt, China, Thailand, and Myanmar and Dr. Charles Drew Memorial International Researcher in Ghana. As a Fulbright Senior Specialist, she was instrumental in providing guidance for the development of a Social Work program at the University of Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia. 

Dr. Fraser has been the recipient of numerous awards: Century Club Inductee (Louisville Male High School), Day-Garret Award (Smith School for Social Work); Alabama Social Work Hall of Fame; Social Work Educator of the Year (Alabama–Mississippi Social Work Educators); Outstanding University Professor (Oakwood University); Boston University School of Social Work Alumni of the Year. 

She holds an AB in Sociology from University of Louisville, MSW from Boston University and PhD from Smith College School for Social Work.

 

Dean and Dorothy A. Miller Research Professor in Social Work Education, University of Kentucky College of Social Work

CSWE will give the 2023 Distinguished Recent Contributions to Social Work Education Award to Justin "Jay" Miller, PhD, Dean and Dorothy A. Miller Research Professor in Social Work Education at the University of Kentucky's College of Social Work.

At the time of his appointment in July 2019, Dean Miller was the youngest dean in the country. He earned his PhD from the University of Louisville.

Dr. Miller is dedicated to a host of social issues and community outreach, a passion which he brings to his work as an educator and scholar. His research and academic interests focus on child welfare and youth involvement in juvenile systems. His work has shaped practice with foster youth and has informed a myriad of policies and practices related to participatory engagement with youth and families. He has practiced in a variety of different contexts at local, state, and federal levels.

In addition to child welfare, Miller is actively leading research related to self-care and wellness. In 2017, he founded The Self-Care Lab (SCL). SCL is the first known lab specifically dedicated to empirically investigating self-care among helping professionals. He has conducted groundbreaking research on broad ranging self-care and wellness research with social workers, educators, nurses, law enforcement, teachers, and attorneys, among others. Through this work, Dr. Miller demonstrates his commitment to address potentially toxic employment conditions and improve life balance. 

Dr. Miller is actively involved in a variety of community service endeavors and has served as the co-founder/past president of the Louisville Association of Social Workers, founder of the Foster Care Peer Support Initiative, and the Kentucky Chapter of the Foster Care Alumni of America. Dr. Miller has also led Kentucky’s Children Justice Act Taskforce, Citizen’s Review Panel, Juvenile Justice Advisory Board, and Board of Social Work. In 2016, Dr. Miller was appointed to the Federal Advisory Committee on Juvenile Justice by OJJDP. 

The impact of Dr. Miller’s work has been recognized regionally, nationally, and internationally. He is a past recipient of the Paul Grannis Award, Sunny Andrews Award, and the Supporting the Workforce Award from the Children’s Bureau, among other awards and recognitions.

Last, but certainly not least, Dean Miller is a loud, proud foster and kinship alum!

Assistant Professor at the Beatriz Lassalle Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Puerto Rico

CSWE will present the 2023 Early Career Faculty Service and Leadership in Social Work Education Award to Diana Margarita Padilla-Medina, PhD, assistant professor at the Beatriz Lassalle Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Puerto Rico.

Her areas of research interest and expertise include intimate partner violence and sexual violence in U.S. and global contexts, health and mental health outcomes of intimate partner and sexual violence, and measurement development in intimate partner violence. Her research has been funded by federal and state entities, including PRIDE-NHLBI, Fulbright, and the Texas Council on Family Violence, and she has published and presented in various national and international conferences and academic journals.

Currently, she is leading a PRIDE/NHLBI-funded research project examining the relationship between intimate partner violence victimization and high blood pressure in racially and ethnically diverse women in the United States. Prior to that, she directed a project together with other colleagues from the Rutgers University School of Social Work and the University of Haifa in Israel, which demonstrated the relationship between physical and mental health factors, including COVID-19, and the perpetration and victimization of intimate partner violence in a diverse sample of non-institutionalized adults in the United States.

In addition to her research, Diana has spearheaded the creation of campus-based healing circles to support students and faculty coping with the personal, interpersonal, and structural stressors engendered in the context of experiencing over the past six years, negative and potentially traumatic life events, including devasting hurricanes and earthquakes, a global pandemic, and political and economic hurdles.   

Diana earned her PhD in social work from New York University and holds two master's degrees in social work and human rights from Columbia University in New York. She was a former Fulbright U.S. Scholar in Colombia and a visiting scholar at the "Program to Increase Diversity in Behavioral Medicine and Sleep Disorders Research" (PRIDE) sponsored by the Miller School of Medicine at the University of Miami and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI).