Congratulations to Nona Moscovitz who was appointed to the Board of Directors for the CIUSSS Centre- Ouest
Nona Moscovitz, instructor for the MSW advanced clinical practice Use of Self course, and the BSW Integrative Seminar and Mental Health courses, Ěýhas been appointed to the Board of Directors for the CIUSSS Centre-Ouest de I’Ile de Montreal, as the mental health expert on the board. ĚýThis appointment recognizes Nona’s extensive practice, supervision and teaching experience in this area.Ěý Felicitations Nona!
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Cindy Blackstock was awarded SSHRC’s highest honour.
Congratulations to Cindy Blackstock on being awarded the SSHRC Gold Medal, the agency’s highest honour.
“The Gold Medal is awarded to an individual whose sustained leadership, dedication, and originality of thought have inspired students and colleagues alike.”
See the in the
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Professor James Torczyner Retires after almost 50 Years at Â鶹AV:
A Remarkable Career in Retrospect
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Sharon Bond, M.S.W., Ph.D., Alicia Boatswain-Kyte, M.S.W., Ph.D., Shari Brotman, M.S.W., Ph.D., Myriam Denov, M.S.W., Ph.D., Francine Granner, M.S.W., Julia Krane, M.S.W., Ph.D. Nicole Ives, M.S.W., Ph.D., Tamara Sussman, M.S.W., Ph.D. Pam Orzeck, M.S.W., Ph.D.
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After almost 50 years at Â鶹AV, Professor James Torczyner bids farewell. James “Jim” Torczyner was no ordinary professor! He was a “boots on the ground professor and activist,” inspiring generations of social workers and students to get out there and advocate for change. Jim came to Â鶹AV in 1973 fresh from the University of California, Berkeley, with his MSW and DSW, planning to stay for a few years. Armed with vision, determination and mischievous charm, Jim had the rare gift of persuasion, convincing others to support his dream of changing the world.
During his 49-year tenure as a Professor at Â鶹AV, Jim’s accomplishments were nothing short of extraordinary. In his review of Jim’s latest publication, Fighting Poverty and Building Peace from Montreal to the Middle East: (Torczyner, 2021), Professor Gil Troy described Jim as a social work “superhero” with a rare mix of grit, guts, and goodness who worked miracles. It’s hard to do justice to his list of accomplishments. In 1975, Jim founded Project Genesis, a grassroots non-profit community organization that empowers people from diverse backgrounds to advocate for entitlements, to change social policy and develop alternative community organizations. This store-front drop-in centre in the CĂ´te des Neiges area of Montreal today remains a hub for advice and advocacy on housing and welfare, targeting the structural inequities of poverty, racism, and discrimination. In 1981 Professor Torczyner founded the Â鶹AV Consortium for Ethnicity and Strategic Social Planning to assist ethnic groups in Canada in articulating community needs through demographic research. Through this initiative, he completed a twelve-volume study of Jewish communities in Canada, a national study of Black communities in Canada and follow up studies of Black communities in Montreal and Toronto. In 1990 Jim founded the Montreal Consortium for Human Rights Advocacy Training (MCHRAT). This University Research Center extended multi-disciplinary expertise to groups that have traditionally lacked access and power. MCHRAT has developed advocacy programs for homeless youths and the severely disabled, assisted in the development of legal services in community-based agencies, and established legal precedent in its defense of the poor against unwarranted state intrusion. In 1993, Professor Torczyner brought the model he developed at Project Genesis to Israel and founded Community Advocacy which independently operates a network of storefront advocacy, outreach, and community organizing services. In 1994, MCHRAT refocused its attention primarily on the Middle East and established The Â鶹AV Middle East Program in Civil Society and Peace Building. (). Working with academic institutions and leading nongovernmental organizations in Israel, Jordan, and Palestine, MMEP has provided some 40 graduate fellowships, assisted in establishing a graduate program in social work at The University of Jordan and three additional centers in Nablus, east Jerusalem, and Amman. It is estimated that his outreach projects have helped over one million people in the Middle East since 1993 - the true number is surely more.
In the classroom, Jim was not the restrained professorial type, quietly generating ideas for research projects with little appeal in the everyday world. Rather, he challenged students with vision and steadfast determination to confront the highest authorities. He was a force to be reckoned with that could stir up dust and speak his mind. He advocated for his clients, spoke their language, understood their needs, and always had their backs. He was dedicated to go to great lengths to fight poverty, racism, and hatred and challenged anyone that got in his way. He inspired many students to pursue social work, activism, and social justice, amongst them some current faculty in the School of Social Work at Â鶹AV.
Social activism was in his DNA. Jim learned these skills from his family, dating back to the fifteenth century. A child of Holocaust survivors, he credits his community skills to his parents and grandmother who escaped the Nazi death camps. Their words of wisdom echoed loudly for Jim with the motto “never again, not to anybody”. His mother’s words were instructive: “If you see something, you have to do something”. He lived by this motto. A proud Jew, from an orthodox family, he grew up in a multicultural community in Manhattan’s West side, the site of West Side Story. His love for culture and community was evidenced in his trailblazing lifetime commitment to bridging divides between cultures, religions, and ethnicities. His approach, as seen in his ground-breaking work in Israel, Palestine, and Jordan, was the creation of “storefronts” dispensing advice; his creative forum was training through the MSW program at Â鶹AV after which his graduates returned to their respective countries, armed with insights and understandings to tackle the cycle of cultural, social, economic, and political breakdown in the Middle East.
Jim, we are forever grateful for your courage and bravery to go where others have feared, establishing a model for empowerment, social justice and community action that will endure for generations to come. You have been an inspiring and supportive colleague always ready to provide help and mentorship with kindness, openness, grit, caring, and humanity. We thank you and wish you well in this next chapter of continued adventures and inspirational community building.
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Creating paths to success for youth in care
A $1-million gift from Â鶹AV alumna and volunteer Martine Turcotte will establish a full-ticket bursary and support program at Â鶹AV for students from Quebec’s youth in care system.
The Centre for Research on Children and Families Â鶹AV at the School of Social Work will be leading the Youth in Care Mentorship and Support component of the program.
Social Work Educator Sheila Goldbloom dies at 96
Sheila Goldbloom, who taught at the School of Social Work between 1964 and 1992, passed away at age 96.Ěý
Professor Goldbloom was involved with a number of community organizations, including Meals on Wheels, l'Abri en Ville and the Foundation of Greater Montreal.Ěý
In 2007, at age 82, she become co-chair of Quebec's commission on living conditions for seniors. Her contributions have been recognized by the Order of Canada and the Ordre national du Québec.
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Read the full tribute to Sheila Goldbloom.
Congratulations to Professor Cindy Blackstock as the winner of the Changemaker Prize
Cindy Blackstock has been awarded the Principal’s Changemaker Prize, which recognizes exceptional individuals whose engagement with the public and the media has effected important societal changes. Professor Blackstock’s advocacy for First Nations children and families has led to a historic 40-billion-dollar settlement from the Federal Government recognizing discriminatory practices that led to the unnecessary placement of tens of thousands of children and failure to provide critical health and social services.
Estelle Hopmeyer Celebrating Â鶹AV Unsung Heroes
Estelle has been selected as one of this year’s Unsung Heroes at Â鶹AV. She was nominated by colleagues at the Â鶹AV Association of University Teachers (MAUT).
We are proud of her contributions to the School of Social Work, notably her dedication to Field Education, Group Work and the development of Self-help Groups (Clinical Practice) and her tenure as Associate and Acting Director of the School. She modelled outreach to the community through her involvement with many initiatives. She was an inspiring teacher, and friend to many and provided an ongoing source of support and comfort for our students and her fellow colleagues. Ěý
It is important to acknowledge our history and upon whose shoulders we all stand.
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Kagedan Lecture: Not One Single COVID Generation: The Impact Of COVID-19 Pandemic On Mental Health And Well-Being From Pre-Birth To Emerging Adulthood
This presentation will review the empirical evidence gathered in the past two years on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health for children and youth, at different life stages from pre-birth to emerging adulthood. Grounded in a social justice framework, this presentation will highlight that all are not equal in the face of the pandemic, and that children and youth living in precarious contexts have been impacted most. Practice and policy measures moving forward to help all children and youth thrive and recover from this unprecedentedĚýworldwide crisis will be discussed.
Presenters: Delphine Collin-VĂ©zina, Ph.D. & Barbara Fallon, Ph.D.
Delphine Collin-VĂ©zina is the Director of the Centre for Research on Children and Families and the Director of the Canadian Consortium on Child & Youth Trauma. A Full Professor in the Â鶹AV School of Social Work, her program of research seeks to better understand the impact of adverse and traumatic life events in the lives of children and youth, as well as their experiences with services geared towards them.
Barbara Fallon holds a Canada Research Chair in Child Welfare at the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work. Her research focuses on the collection and sharing of reliable, valid national and provincial data to provide an evidence-based understanding of the trajectories of children and families in the child welfare system.
Location/Time:
In-person, at 550 Sherbrooke St.Ěý#189 and broadcasted viaĚý.
DATE:Ěý TBD
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INVITED LECTURE ByĚýDr. Rosine Horincq Detournay -ĚýThe Alliance with Relational Systems
With a PhD in Psychology & Education from Université Libre de Bruxelles, Dr. Rosine Horincq Detournay has been working for many years in Belgium as a psychologist, relational therapist and supervisor.
The lecture Dr. Detournay will be delivering concerns the alliance with relational systems. This is a common factor recognized as one of the most critical to favour the most effective guidance both in psychotherapy and in social work interventions. From an experience of a family situation characterized by critical incidents of alliance with the practitioners, our goal will be to elaborate in a reflexive and collaborative way on the alliance, mobilizing knowledge and results of research, in order to identify the actions and criteria that best favour the alliance, to create and maintain it, as we would like to concretely develop it with the relational systems that we meet.
Thu, Apr 14th, 2022 @ 11 am-12:15 pm
In person: Room#189, 550 Sherbrooke Via Zoom Meeting
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INVITED LECTURE By Ainsley Jenicek - The Families we choose and what they mean for all families:Ěý Rethinking Approaches to Family Therapy
Ainsley Jenicek is a clinical Social Worker, Couple and Family Therapist (CFT), and Psychotherapist currently pursuing a PhD in Â鶹AV School of Social Work. She continues to work in private practice providing individual, couple and family therapy as well as teaching within Â鶹AV School of Social Work. Prior to embarking on her PhD, she interned and worked for several years in child and youth psychiatry at the Jewish General Hospital providing intake evaluations as well as individual and family therapy. Additionally, she worked at the Ordre des travailleurs sociaux et thĂ©rapeutes conjugaux et familiaux (OTSTCFQ) to support the development of four RĂ©fĂ©rentiels describing the competencies and professional inspection process for CFTs in Quebec and to help increase the visibility of the profession within the province.
Ainsley’s lecture entitled “The families we choose and what they mean for all families: Rethinking Approaches to Family Therapy” will present the concept of chosen family systems, therapeutic frameworks for understanding them, as well as implications for family therapy assessment and treatment.
ĚýFri, Apr 8th, 2022 @ 2:45-4 pm
ĚýIn person: Room#189, 550 Sherbrooke
INVITED LECTURE BY Syndie David -Ěý Existing Outside the Norm: Approaches to Family Therapy
Syndie David is currently a PhD candidate at UniversitĂ© du QuĂ©bec Ă MontrĂ©al. Having always wanted to work with racialized youth, she decided to do her first undergraduate degree in psychology. Quickly realizing that racialized and marginalized communities were not accessing psychological services, she used her studies in psychology to prepare for her admission to the Â鶹AV Special BSW program and has now been a frontline social worker for nearly 15 years.
Syndie’s lecture entitled “Existing Outside the Norm: Critical Approaches to Family Therapy” will explore how our history of colonialism has established and maintained Whiteness as the normative experience and how this socially constructed standard is systemically embedded in couple and family therapy training. It will also discuss how including critical approaches and emphasizing the need for critical consciousness in family therapy are necessary steps towards making a real attempt at decolonizing the profession.
Fri, Apr 1st, 2022 @ 12:30-1:45 pm
In person: Room#189, 550 Sherbrooke
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Jeffrey McCrossin receives the 2021-2022 Arts Graduate Teaching Award
The School of Social Work wishes to congratulate doctoral candidate Jeffery McCrossin who is this year's recipient of the Arts Graduate Teaching Award. Jeffery received the award in recognition of his significant and innovative contributions to classroom teaching.
The award will be formally announced at the Arts Faculty Council meeting on May 24, 2022 at 3 pm, via ZOOM.Ěý
Congratulations to Cindy Blackstock for beingĚýnamed one of Canada’s women of influence.
Cindy Blackstock, a professor at the School of Social Work, has been named one of Canada’s Top 25 Women of Influence (Â鶹AV Reporter).
See article in theĚý.
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Let's Listen & Connect
For more information, contact nicole.mitchell2 [at] mcgill.ca (Nicole Mitchell)
Where:ĚýĚý
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Centering Blackness in Social Work:
Afrocentric Approaches to Practice
FEBRUARY 18, 2022 – 1:00-4:00pm
See PosterĚýfor details.
To view the event, click .
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Interview with Cindy Blackstock: The 15-year fight to treat Indigenous children as equals
Cindy Blackstock, the executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society and a professor at Â鶹AV's School of Social Work, has made it her mission to make sure First Nations kids get the care that matches up with care received by other kids in Canada. She talks about the long fight for this agreement, and why she’s still waiting to celebrate. (Front Burner, CBC News)
Front Burner: The 15-year fight to treat Indigenous children as equals
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