News

A study out of the University of Massachusetts Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences revealed the perceived discrimination experienced by women who decline certain medical procedures during pregnancy and childbirth, such as cesarean sections, epidurals, and episiotomies. Reports of...Read more about Dr. Tina Sacks Weighs in on Study Regarding Pregnancy Care Discrimination

With the passing of Phyllis Koshland Friedman on July 2, 2019, Berkeley Social Welfare lost one of its most steadfast supporters.

Phyllis earned her BA in Social Welfare in 1944 — one of the first to graduate from our program — and came back in mid-life to earn her MSW here in 1971. She...Read more about In Memoriam: Phyllis Koshland Friedman

Professor Linda M. Burton has been named the next dean of Berkeley Social Welfare. Currently the James B. Duke Professor of Sociology, and previously dean of Social Sciences and director of the Center for Child and Family Policy at Duke University, Burton will bring extensive leadership...Read more about Renowned Child Welfare Scholar Linda M. Burton Named Dean of Berkeley Social Welfare

The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world. In 2016, over 6.6 million adults were under correctional supervision, and an additional 975,000 youths under 18 had cases pass through the juvenile court system. The impacts of justice system involvement are disproportionately...Read more about Erin Kerrison and Jennifer Skeem Address one of the Grand Challenges of Social Work

Meeting Greg Evans (MSW '86) in the high-rise office of the McGuireWoods law firm in downtown San Francisco, you wouldn't guess that he opened his first law office in a homeless shelter. As a law student in South Bend, Indiana, he had worked with the school's Dean and the community to open a...Read more about Law in Service to the Public Good: Greg Evans (MSW '86)

The journey to success is rarely a smooth and linear path. For UC Berkeley School of Social Welfare undergraduate Begonia Herbert-Ramirez, the path to becoming a University Medal nominee with a 4.0 GPA was particularly trying. Through the ups and downs, however, were two things that kept her...Read more about Begonia Herbert-Ramirez: Finding a Home in Haviland Hall

Ella Callow, this year's commencement speaker for Berkeley Social Welfare, has spent her career tackling one of the central questions of inclusion. "How do barriers impact the well-being of individuals with disabilities? And how can the system better serve these families so that we're being...Read more about Commencement Speaker Ella Callow (BA '97)

"I'll admit it — I had preconceived notions about Sammie when I first met her."

Jill Duerr-Berrick, School of Social Welfare faculty and Zellerbach Family Foundation Professor, recalls the first time she saw Sammie Gilmore seated toward the front of her classroom...Read more about Building a “Prison-to-School” Pipeline: Sammie Gilmore Flips the Narrative

The Berkeley Social Welfare community is invited to participate in the Coercive Treatment – Moving Beyond “for Your Own Good" Conference. The...Read more about Conference: Coercive Treatment — Moving Beyond "For your Own Good"

We were saddened to learn of the passing of Tumanako Wereta, the long-time Chair of the Tuaropaki Trust, a pioneering Maori trust in the North Island of New Zealand. In recent years, Berkeley Social Welfare and the Goldman School of Public Policy have developed a close...Read more about Passing of Tumanako Wereta, Chair of Tuaropaki Trust

Social Welfare doctoral student Katie Savin has been the grad student rep in organizing for a ...Read more about Social Welfare PhD student involved in organizing for disability cultural center

Dr. Miller will spend some time on methods, specifically the practice of ethnographic research, the debates on positionality and reflexivity and what we can learn by getting close to our work. He will draw from his field notes to make...Read more about Dr. Reuben Miller: "The Afterlife of Incarceration"

In US News and World Report's latest rankings of the country's best universities in academic quality, Berkeley Social Welfare has placed in the top...Read more about Berkeley Social Welfare MSW Program Ranked #3 in Nation

Jessica Blanche Peixotto is credited with being the founder of social welfare studies at Berkeley. Her family’s story can be traced back to the time when Christopher Columbus was setting off for the New World. On the Iberian Peninsula in the late 1400s the Inquisition was in full swing. One...Read more about Our Founding Mother: Jessica Blanche Peixotto

What are some of the current challenges to maintaining social welfare programs for the nation’s most vulnerable people in the Trump era? Assistant Professor Tina Sacks explores this issue in the latest podcast in the Berkeley Talks series. Her lecture gives an overview of the incidence and...Read more about Assistant Professor Tina Sacks featured on Berkeley Talks

Dear Social Welfare Community,

We are living through a period of widening hate driven violence across our country and in many communities. Some communities have long been on the receiving end of such violence but it is clearly accelerating, whether the target is a Black church, a group of...Read more about Dean's Reflections on Hate-driven Incidents

Dear Social Welfare Community,

I write to reflect on the events in Washington DC and elsewhere in our country last week. On Thursday we witnessed two starkly different testimonies before the Senate Judiciary Committee about events decades in the past. Dr. Ford offered a humble account of...Read more about Dean's Reflections on Recent Senate Hearings