Chapter News

Rural/Frontier Social Work Committee:

NASW-NV. Rural Task Force is actively seeking additional members! The task force was formed in early 2020 with a mission to engage social work professionals that are living or working in the rural areas of the state in order to identify their unique needs, increase chapter support, make recommendations to the NASW Nevada Board, and facilitate communication with colleagues that are in the urban areas as well as our community partners. The Rural Task Force resumed meeting in October after a summer hiatus. A new meeting day was approved and future meetings will be held via a Zoom link on the second Monday of every month at 5:00 p.m.

The task force is currently working on several projects; first, we are in the midst of a Community Assessment Project, with a long-term goal of building a coalition among our rural and frontier communities to address common concerns. We are also reaching out to our colleges and universities to explore how the Nevada Chapter of NASW can help support students in their pursuit of careers serving rural populations. Finally, the task force is tracking the progress of the federal infrastructure bill in order to be prepared to advocate for Nevada’s needs as funds become available.

If you are interested in social work in Nevada's rural and frontier regions, please join us! You can email Tom Durante for further details at tomdurantelcsw@gmail.com and attend a meeting as either a guest or a task force member! 

Membership and Community Outreach Committee:

After the NASW-NV Chapter Community Outreach Volunteer Project (COVP)’s flyer was shared with students, we had several volunteers. In November, I communicated with the agencies to learn more about the following steps and contacted the volunteers to navigate them. Also, I made site visits with Las Vegas Rescue Mission and Hope Link.

The COVP is an essential project to give back to our community as social workers. Non-profit organizations play a huge part in our society by serving services to people who are in need. And volunteers are the backbone of non-profit organizations. Therefore, we are aiming to make COVP sustainable for years. In light of this goal, In order to determine the feasibility of continuing the COVP, the NASW-NV Chapter Agency Field Instructor Sandra Abdullah and I created two surveys, one for volunteers and one for the agencies, and eblast them.

Additionally, I participated in one of Sandra Abdullah’s presentations she gave to BSW students at UNLV. I saw that BSW students did not know anything about the NASW. However, during the presentation, they became interested in learning more about the NASW. Also, I provided information about COVP to them. Most of them showed interest in volunteering in the COVP.

Lastly, I attended the NASW-NV Chapter Racial Equity and Membership and Community Outreach Committee's meeting as an observer. I saw how excellent and passionate women are productive and have inspiring ideas about creating projects. We talked about how we could make a place for the BIPOC students to speak and share their problems, feelings, and experiences. We discussed things that we could do for the BIPOC community.