CAPTA Reauthorization Bill Signed Into Law On December 20, President Obama signed into law the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Reauthorization Act of 2010 (CAPTA), formerly S. 3817. The law promotes the use of differential response in child protective services, gives special attention to the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence, and sharpens the prevention focus of the community-based child abuse... 

During the State of the Union Address, the President reiterated his deep commitment to addressing and fixing our nation’s broken immigration system.  To read more, go: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/01/27/immigration-winning-future NASW is also committed to comprehensive immigration reform.   According to the Immigrants and Refugees Policy Statement in Social Work Speaks (Eighth Edition), NASW supports federal,... 

Recently, it was reported that for the second consecutive year, the United States has lost more troops to suicide than combat.  This news comes on the heels of a guide for military families issued by the Department of Veterans Affairs that focuses on mental health.  While these two points do not go perfectly hand in hand (the distinction between active troops and veterans, for example), it is clear that the mental health... 

On Monday, January 31, 2011, from 1:00-2:00pm Eastern Time, NASW is hosting a teleconference on Health Care Reform with Stephen Gorin, PhD, Executive Director of the NASW New Hampshire Chapter. The moderator for the call is Dina Kastner, NASW Senior Field Organizer. The call will cover the limits and possibilities of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) signed into law last year by President Obama. NASW... 

The NASW Press ispleased to announce the launch of our new, entirely online manuscript submission and peer-review system. Of our peer-reviewed journal Web sites, those for Children & Schools and Health & Social Work are now live. The journals Social Work and Social Work Research will be migrating to the online submission portal later this calendar year. Please visit us at http://www.naswpress.org/authors/guidelines/05-submissions.html... 

The phenomenon of girl fighting has piqued scholarly and popular interest in recent years, and yet few have studied the factors that contribute to the problem.  Recently a group of social work researchers decided to investigate girl fighting by interviewing several teenage girls in focus groups at middle schools in the northeastern US.  The participants of the focus groups were recruited by a guidance counselor and... 

Through its history as an organized profession, social work has worked under two competing models or philosophies: paternalism and empowerment. But perhaps a third model will provide a more comprehensive view for client care and empowerment.  In “Reconciling Paternalism and Empowerment in Clinical Practice: An Intersubjective Perspective” in the January 2011 issue of Social Work, Cassandra L. Bransford discusses... 

Just days after the new Medicare regulation to allow end-of-life planning as part of the annual physical exam began, the Obama administration reversed its decision.  On January 5, CMS announced that the first annual wellness visit and subsequent annual wellness visits in Medicare will not include voluntary advance care planning.  CMS cited an error in procedure led to the reversal of the rule.  As advocates for self-determination,... 

On January 18, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius released a new analysis showing that, without the Affordable Care Act, up to 129 million non-elderly Americans who have some type of pre-existing health condition would be at risk of losing health insurance when they need it most, or be denied coverage altogether.   Repealing the law would once again leave millions of Americans worrying about... 

Maurice O. Hunt (1912-2010) Obituary Maurice O. Hunt was involved in social activism throughout his professional social work career. He obtained his MA in 1938 from the Indiana Training School for Social Work, which became the Indiana University School of Social Work.  His involvement in the profession spans fifty years and included a stint in Greece during World War II with the United States Relief and Rehabilitation...