Alumni & Friends

The College of Social Work and other colleges and organizations across FSU’s campus participated in the Great Give, a 36-hour online giving campaign, April 18-19, 2013. The campaign allowed each group to raise money and support unique projects throughout the University.

The College raised funds to develop the FSU Healthy Relationships Online Toolkit, which focuses on violence prevention education and set its fundraising target at $20,000. During the 36-hour campaign the College received 77 gifts and made 16% of the funds needed to complete the launch of the site. 

A new toolkit developed by Florida State University researchers to prevent domestic violence involving law enforcement officers is now available to all criminal justice agencies in the Southeast in the first phase of a plan to make the toolkit available to agencies across the nation.

The Florida State University (FSU) College of Social Work (CSW) collaborated with FSU’s Center for Academic Retention and Enhancement (CARE), the FSU Art Education Department, the FSU Athletics Department, and the 

Doctoral candidate Jane McPherson’s research examines the area where social work and human rights intersect. Upon entering the doctoral program at the FSU College of Social Work, she was awarded FSU’s Presidential Scholarship, providing her four years of support from the University.  In 2013, the Graduate School honored her with the Graduate Research & Creativity Award and the Graduate Leadership Award.

Faculty member Janet Berry retired at the end of this summer to begin a new chapter in her life.  On top of being an alumna of the FSU College of Social Work, Janet has been a long-time faculty member at the College, taking on various roles and responsibilities.  Included among these roles were the development of the online MSW degree program and the online Leadership in Executive and Administrative Development (LEAD) Certificate Program as well as coordinating and designing the Capstone Assignment for Field Seminars.

Over the summer a permanent legacy to honor Dr. Wendy P. Crook (pictured right) and her family was established in the form of the endowed Violet Crook Graduate Scholarship. In November 2006, Dr. Crook pledged a donation to begin the scholarship. Tragically, Dr. Crook passed away in October 2007 at age 55 from cancer before the scholarship could be endowed.

Elizabeth Koalska Piccard, better known as Betty, was a valued faculty member of the College of Social Work from 1965 until 1993, serving for many years as the Undergraduate Program Director. Recently, on August 29, 2013 she died peacefully in her sleep in Tallahassee, a place she called home since 1953.

The family of Mrs. Julie Hawes Matthews honored the memory of their mother with a generous donation of to three FSU programs – the College of Social Work, the College of Nursing and the Department of Interior Design.

“I did my initial field placement in gerontology and it was right after my dad died. He was an older gentleman and I really saw the need. Social workers are always talking about those personal experiences and I had that experience and decided that was the way I wanted to go,” Victoria (Vicky) Thomas reflected when seated at her desk at Elder Day Stay, a facility run by Elder Care Services, Inc. in Tallahassee, Florida.

The fall 2013 semester marked the beginning of a new tradition recognizing five distinguished graduates from the College of Social Work at the annual student scholarship dinner.  The College’s commitment to service lives on through its students and alumni, exemplified by the five special people acknowledged at this year’s dinner, including the Distinguished Emeritus Alumni Award (Joyce Laidlaw), Distinguished Young Alumni Award (Dana Morris-Brooks), Distinguished Field Educator Award (Sharon Maxwell-Ferguson), Distinguished Alumni in Social Work Practice Award (Jeanene J