Dean’s Message: Resources, Impact, Updates, Census 2020
April 13, 2020
Dear BUSSW Community,
I hope this email finds you and your loved ones safe and healthy. As we begin another week transformed by the Covid-19 pandemic and look for ways to process the surreal changes it has brought to our daily lives, I want to remind our community that resources are available for you. I also want to thank you for the resilience, patience and compassion you have shown as we find new ways to continue our work together — from faculty and staff who are innovating new ways to deliver curriculum and field education while managing their own personal challenges, to our students who are persevering through numerous obstacles to complete their semester. I know that many are trying to cope with the health, social and economic impact of this disease, and physical distancing weighs on the mental health of us all. Please refer to the BUSSW COVID-19 page for a list of resources to address issues such as financial hardship, behavioral health support and mutual aid.
Resources
The BU community is here to support you. For health-related questions, Boston University has set up a COVID-19 hotline for students, faculty, staff, and visiting scholars: please call 617-358-4990, Monday through Friday from 9 am to 5 pm.
Faculty and staff who are under mandatory quarantine should review this important information from Human Resources. For students with COVID-19-related concerns, please follow these directions to complete the secure form online and connect with a nurse.
And please remember, the University’s COVID-19 website is updated frequently with news and resources. BU has also created a resource for graduate students here.
Social Work Impact
As a social work community, we can see how this crisis amplifies the many inequities in our society – ones that we have been working to eradicate. As the ripple effects of the pandemic become clear, we find ourselves more committed than ever to our mission to make a measurable, positive impact on the lives of those affected by racial, social, and economic disparities. Several faculty members are sharing their expertise, providing tools to help communities, and beginning research on vital aspects of the disease’s impact on mental health. This is only the beginning of what we, as social workers, will need to address in the months and years ahead.
I’d like to highlight a few of the ways BUSSW is making an impact:
- Chris Hyeouk Hahm and partners at Brigham & Women’s have begun a new project: COVID-19 Adult Resilience Experiences Study (CARES): Examining young adults’ health, sleep, and psychological well-being.
- Our Professional Education Program launched an online support group led by Mark Gianino for social work alumni — to overwhelming response. Additional programs are under consideration.
- A report from Tom Byrnes and collaborators estimating the needs of the homeless populations has evolved into a web app for communities to use and garnered media attention across the country.
- Linda Sprague Martinez’s expertise on racial inequities has been sought out by the media.
- CISWH researcher, Meg Comeau, is conducting a project to address COVID-19 and care of children with medical complexities around the nation.
- Luz Lopez is leading a webinar entitled COVID 19 and the Impact on Intimate Partner Violence for Latinos on April 30th with support from the National Latino and Hispanic Mental Health Technology Transfer Center. Stay tuned for more information on this.
School Updates
Following up on President Brown’s recent message about summer courses being delivered remotely, we will share more information on our summer plans very soon. Please note that this decision, and many others during this unprecedented time, are made at the University level and are informed by city, state, and federal government mandates and recommendations about social distancing for safety reasons. We ask for your patience as we respond to these changes and develop our next steps as quickly as possible. The University is also working on contingency plans for the upcoming semesters which are detailed in this BU Today story. (Please note some media have misreported these plans. To be clear, BU’s recovery planning is focused on the fall semester, and the resumption of our on-campus, in-person programs in late August. We are planning accordingly and will incorporate the best public health practices into those plans so that members of the BU community will feel comfortable and safe on campus upon their return for fall semester. If for some reason public health authorities do not allow universities to re-open their residential campuses at that time, our planning will explore other alternatives, including the possibility of restarting later in the year. For the time being, please know that the University is still planning to open the residential campus for the fall semester.)
As many of you know, due to BU’s postponement of commencement, we created a committee with student representatives from CRC, OCP, and OLP to explore the possibility of doing a virtual celebration to acknowledge our graduates in May. (Please note: this event is not meant to be a replacement for a potential in-person event at a later date.) A student survey was sent out April 3 to gather feedback. We are analyzing the results and will share more information about next steps shortly.
2020 Census
At this time, when so much feels out of our control, one thing we can do right now is help with the U.S. 2020 Census. BUSSW faculty Kate Audette is working with Mayor Walsh’s Census Complete Count Committee and is encouraging our community of social workers to make sure the census has accurate information for all the populations we support. I hope that, while physically distancing, you will find opportunities to share this information with your family and friends, faith communities and clients you serve to ensure they complete the Census. You can respond to the 2020 Census online (my2020census.gov), over the phone (support available in 13 languages), or by mail.
It goes without saying that completing the Census matters more than ever; it will help ensure that our communities are allocated the federal funds that will be desperately needed in the recovery phase of this pandemic.
If you have questions about completing the Census, please contact Kate directly at kathryn.audette@gmail.com
Please take care and be well,
Dean Delva