{"id":37279,"date":"2018-07-17T13:03:01","date_gmt":"2018-07-17T17:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/?post_type=profile&p=37279"},"modified":"2026-04-13T17:40:02","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T21:40:02","slug":"lenette-azzi-lessing","status":"publish","type":"profile","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/profile\/lenette-azzi-lessing\/","title":{"rendered":"Lenette Azzi-Lessing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lene<\/span>tt<\/span>e Azzi-Lessing is a clinical professor of social work and coordinator of the Specialization in Children, Youth and Families at Boston University School of Social Work<\/span>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/span>The author of “Behind from the Start: How America’s War on the Poor is Harming Our Most Vulnerable Children”, Dr. Azzi-Lessing\u2019s work focuses on improving the wellbeing and life chances of vulnerable, young children, and their families, particularly those living in poverty and those involved in the child protective system.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As a senior fellow at the Child Welfare League of America, she has promoted the wellbeing of vulnerable children and families through reform of the child welfare system. She is the author of \u201cBehind from the Start: How America\u2019s War on the Poor is Harming Our Most Vulnerable Children,\u201d as well as numerous other publications.<\/span><\/p>\n

Prior to joining the BU faculty, she was Professor of Social Work at Wheelock College, the founding director of Wheelock\u2019s Graduate Certificate Program in Early Childhood Mental Health, and faculty leader of its Partnership for Early Childhood Development in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. Azzi-Lessing was named a Fulbright Specialist by the U.S. State Department in 2017.<\/span><\/p>\n

She has developed and taught a broad range of courses and provided training and consultation throughout the United States, in South Africa, and in other countries. In addition to her academic work, Azzi-Lessing has more than 25 years\u2019 experience as a social worker, agency leader, and policy advocate.<\/span><\/p>\n

Professor Azzi-Lessing’s Google Scholar Profile<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14623,"template":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile\/37279"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/profile"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14623"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile\/37279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80223,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile\/37279\/revisions\/80223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/ssw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}