Last year, NASW-CA’s Diversity & Inclusion Committee put their heads together and compiled a list of noteworthy and influential Black social workers that have made significant contributions to our profession, and along the way have helped to change the course of US History to become a more equitable society. Now we are expanding our Spotlight Series with more social workers!
If you would like to add anyone to our Spotlight Series, please contact Jane at jkim.naswca@socialworkers.org
Dr. Darlyne Bailey, LISW
Darlyne Bailey is a professor, dean emeritus, and director of the social justice initiative at Bryn Mawr College. She was one of the first women to attend Lafayette College, and went on to receive her master’s degree at Columbia University. Bailey helped start a community mental health center at Case Western Reserve University, where she later earned her doctorate. In 1994, she was appointed Dean of the Mandel School for Applied Social Sciences at Case Western.
Bailey was recently honored by the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) as a Social Work Pioneer. Her work emphasizes a multidisciplinary, multicultural approach to health and human services, as well as leadership development and organizational behavior.
Photo Source: Flickr
Source: https://dworakpeck.usc.edu/news/honoring-the-african-american-women-who-have-changed-social-work
Dr. Ruby Gourdine, MSW
Now a professor at Howard University, Ruby Gourdine began her career as a probation officer in the Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court of Richmond, Virginia, where she became interested in issues of race and child welfare. After receiving her master’s degree at the University of Atlanta, she became the first professional social worker hired by the Roxbury Children’s Center, where she would develop their adoption program.
Gourdine was then recruited by the Spaulding Group to develop special needs adoption programs in Washington, D.C. Her work on behalf of children with disabilities led her to become the State Supervisor for Social Work Services in the D.C. public school system.
Photo Source: WalletHub
Source: https://dworakpeck.usc.edu/news/honoring-the-african-american-women-who-have-changed-social-work
Dr. Ruth McRoy, MSW
Following 25 years of teaching at the University of Texas at Austin, Ruth McRoy now directs the RISE (Research and Innovations in Social, Economic, & Environmental Equity) Program at Boston College. Her research focuses on the history and philosophy of American social welfare, as well as issues surrounding adoption and foster care. McRoy also contributes to the AdoptUSKids project, studying barriers to special needs adoptions.
McRoy has published over 100 articles and 12 books, and has received many honors in her lifetime, including being selected as a fellow of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare in 2010.
Photo Source: Steve Hicks School of Social Work
Source: https://dworakpeck.usc.edu/news/honoring-the-african-american-women-who-have-changed-social-work
Dr. Charles Howard
In 1983, Charles Howard, PhD, was one of three founding members of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) Black Caucus, whose mission was to expand professional opportunities for African-American social workers. The Caucus went on to help elevate the cause of combating racism within the association’s agenda. The Caucus helped develop and implement NASW’s Affirmative Action Plan and led the movement to replace the designation of “Negro” with “Black” within the social work community.
As the first minority caucus in NASW, the Black Caucus was the template for future minority caucuses including the Asian, Latino, and Native American Caucuses. These four minority groups were recognized by the Board of Directors of NASW and later incorporated into NASW as National Committee on Minority Affairs (NCOMA). Based on their advocacy, the Black Caucus membership grew significantly to more than 6,000 members prior to the creation of NCOMA.
NASW continued to implement many of the programs that the Black Caucus had produced, most notably the Verne L. Lyons Scholarship program. Mr. Lyons was a staff member and Director of the NASW National Office’s health care initiative; whose goal was to aid in the training of future African-American professional social workers for health care careers in the African-American community. Howard had the honor of being appointed the first Chair of the Lyons Scholarship Fund Committee, which continues to award scholarships today.
Photo Source: NASW Foundation
Hortense King McClinton, MSW
Hortense, paved the way for African American social workers in North Carolina by removing obstacles and implementing systems to ease their transition from MSW graduates to full-time workers. Many would say that securing a Bachelor’s Degree from Howard University in 1939, followed by a Master’s of Social Work Degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Work in 1941, would be reason enough to celebrate Hortense McClinton. But she proved to be first in many other ways.
McClinton was the first African American professional social worker to be employed in several public, private, and governmental social agencies, including the Durham County Department of Social Services (DSS) and the Veteran’s Administration Hospital in Durham, North Carolina. She was also the first African American professor hired in 1966 by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, at the School of Social Work. As a trained social worker, McClinton contributed social work skills and knowledge in a field that, at the time, taught more theory than practice.
McClinton’s professional competence demanded that hiring policies change at the university and that direct practice approaches be tailored more appropriately to acknowledge diversity. She illuminated the significance of culturally competent practices and taught the skills and knowledge that social workers needed to provide services without racial and cultural bias.
Photo Source: NASW Foundation
George Edmund Hayes
George Hayes was a social worker, educator, and Co-Founder and first Executive Director of the National Urban League. He was born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. He attended Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, where he earned a BA Degree. In 1904, he received an MA Degree from Yale University. While studying at the University of Chicago during the summers of 1906 and 1907, Dr. Haynes became interested in social problems affecting Black migrants from the South. This interest led him to the New York School of Philanthropy, from which he graduated in 1910. Two years later he received a PhD from Columbia University. Columbia University Press published his doctoral dissertation, The Negro at Work in New York City.
Within this period, he also involved himself in the activities of the American Association for the Protection of Colored Women; the Committee for Improving the Industrial Conditions of Negroes in New York; and the Committee on Urban Conditions Among Negroes. He was instrumental in merging these groups into one organization, named the National League on Urban Conditions Among Negroes (NLUCAN), now known as the National Urban League. He served as its Executive Director from 1911-1918.
Earlier, while still a graduate student, he had been Secretary of the Colored Men’s Department of the International Committee of the YMCA, during which time he visited black colleges and encouraged students to achieve scholastic excellence, and to help black colleges set high academic standards. He established the Association of Negro Colleges and Secondary Schools, and served that organization as Secretary from 1910-1918. He also helped the New York School of Philanthropy and NLUCAN in collaborative planning that led to the establishment of the first social work training center for black graduate students at Fisk, and he directed that center from 1910-1918.
He supervised field placements of League fellows at the New York School and was Professor of Economics and Sociology at Fisk. On leave from Fisk from 1918-1921, he served as Director of Negro Economics in the United States Department of Labor. As a Special Assistant to the Secretary of Labor, he was involved in matters of racial conflict in employment, housing, and recreation. He continued his earlier studies of exclusion of black workers from certain trade unions, interracial conditions in the workplace, and child labor. These studies resulted in numerous scholarly works. One of the most significant of these was The Negro at Work During the World War and During Reconstruction. The work’s widespread and profound impact resulted in his appointment as a member of the President’s Unemployment Conference in 1921.
Photo Source: C.R.I.S.P.
Lester Blackwell Granger
Lester Blackwell Granger introduced civil rights to the social work agenda as a national and international issue. He focused attention and advocacy energy on the goal of equal opportunity and justice for all people of color, even while focusing on the condition of black people in the United States. He is credited with leading the development of unions among black workers, as well as integrating white unions. He led the integration of black workers in defense industries and the beginnings of integration in the military services during World War II.
Born in Newport News in 1897, he was a graduate of Dartmouth College, and took postgraduate work at New York University, and studied at the New York School of Social Work. His career in social work began in 1922, as an extension worker in Bordentown. He also, at one time, was Secretary on Negro Welfare of the Welfare Council of New York City. He joined the National Urban League’s Workers Educational Section from 1934 to 1938, served as Assistant Executive Secretary in 1940-1941 and as Executive Director from 1941-1961. Mr. Granger had been a member of the President’s Committee on Equal Opportunity in the Arm Forces and of the Federal Advisory Council on Employment Security, serving at one time as its Chairman.
He had been a Special Consultant to Navy Secretaries James V. Forrestal and Charles S. Thomas, and was instrumental in drawing up the Navy’s post-World War II integration program, and later helping solve problems arising from the Navy’s abolishing segregation. For his contributions, Mr. Granger was awarded the Navy Medal for Distinguished Service and the President’s Medal for Merit. He was the first black person to serve as President of the National Conference of Social Work and the International Conference for Social Work. He also had been Vice President of the American Association of Social Workers, Honorary President of the International Council on Social Welfare, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). He was President of one of the seven organizations that merged to form NASW. After retiring from the National Urban League, he served for a number of years as a Visiting Professor of Sociology at Princeton, Loyola, Tulane, and Dillard Universities.
Photo Source: BlackPast
Explore last year’s resources:
- Social Worker Highlight Series – Part 1
- Social Worker Highlight Series – Part 2
- Black History & Art Guide 2021
Check out this year’s Black History & Art Guide:
