Publisher's Thoughts Spring 2015

Dear Reader,

    We have just completed the most amazing month of the year for social workers—Social Work Month! This year, The New Social Worker asked social workers, students, and educators to send in their writing and other talents for our 2015 Social Work Month Series and Talent Show. The result was a wonderfully diverse collection of essays, poems, art, music, videos, and more! You can read, view, and listen to the entire series at: http://www.socialworker.com/extras/social-work-month-2015 (See page 21 for more information.)

    Additionally, more than 200 social workers and social work students converged on the nation’s capital on March 17, World Social Work Day. We have a report on that event on page 23.

    April is National Poetry Month! Starting this year, we are publishing the top three winners of the National Writing Contest for Social Workers, a poetry contest held by the University of Iowa. The three winning entries are on page 28.

    Risk is a common theme in social work. Allan Barsky’s Ethics Alive column addresses risks of risk management. Peter Smyth writes about harm reduction with high risk youth.

    Readers have asked us for more articles providing practical tips for social work practice. On page 10, Natalie Pope and Jacquelyn Lee provide a step-by-step guide to creating a genogram in Microsoft Word. Ellen Belluomini’s Part 2 on parenting digital natives provides guidelines for working with parents and their adolescents.

    Continuing her Career Connect column, Valerie Arendt tackles the important issue of salary negotiation. And in their racial equity column for this issue, Mary Pender Greene, Sandra Bernabei, and Lisa Blitz look at racial history and historical trauma.

    Enjoy the articles, and then go to our website and share them with friends, colleagues, and classmates.

    To subscribe to THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER’s Social Work E-News and notifications of new issues of the magazine, go to the “Subscribe” link on our website at http://www.socialworker.com. (It’s free!)

    Until next time—happy reading!