GSSW Magazine - University of Denver

gssw alumni news
2011 aLumni aWarDS
Recipients of GSSW’s
2011 Alumni Awards are
(L-R) Councilwoman
Judith Montero (MSW ’78),
Robert Kelsall (MSW ’75),
LCSW, AAMFT Approved
Supervisor, and Youlon
Savage (MSW ’64), ACSW.
The awards were presented
at the Colorado Social Work
Month Annual Celebration
on March 9.
34 spring 12 gssw alumni news
Robert L. Hawkins Social
Work Achievement Award
This award is presented to an alumnus/alumna who
has demonstrated professional achievement by being
named executive director, manager, chairperson of the
board, etc., of a social work agency or organization; or
by reaching a level of prominence in education, practice
or politics, etc.; or by receiving national recognition in
the field of social work. This award is named in honor
of Robert L. Hawkins, MSW ’67, who rose through
the ranks at Colorado Psychiatric Institute in Pueblo,
eventually becoming the first social worker appointed
as its Superintendent. Under Hawkins’ leadership, the
Institute became a model psychiatric treatment facility.
The public service career of Councilwoman Judith Montero,
MSW ’78, spans more than 30 years. She has served on
the Denver City Council since 2003, representing one of
the most diverse districts in the city. Montero carried one
of the Council’s heaviest loads of committee work during
her first term. Re-elected to a second term in 2007, she
currently serves on Blueprint Denver, is Vice-Chair of the
Neighborhood, Community & Business Revitalization
Committee, and chairs FasTracks, which oversees efforts
to balance transit needs with future regional growth.
Montero is also a member of the Mayor’s South Platte
River Commission and the Mayor’s Commission to End
Homelessness.
Montero was nominated for the Social Work Achievement
Award by Stephanie Syner (MSW ’06), who served
as Montero’s aide during Syner’s concentration year
internship.
Community Service Award
This award is presented to an alumnus/alumna
who has demonstrated significant and continuous
volunteer involvement in major community
activities and/or charitable causes, above and
beyond his/her employed position.
Robert Kelsall, MSW ’75, LCSW, AAMFT Approved
Supervisor, has had an enormous impact on
social work in Colorado, not only on the families
he serves directly, but also on the therapists he
trains to serve families in the future. He has been
a long time volunteer for the Pro-Bono Project,
providing mental health services to those who
could not otherwise afford them. As co-owner and
co-director of the Denver Family Therapy Center,
Inc., Kelsall provides mental health and substance
abuse services to individuals, groups and families,
as well as training and supervising MSW students
who begin work toward the Certificate in Couples
and Family Therapy during their concentration
year. Kelsall’s previous honors include being
named “Supervisor of the Year” by the Colorado
Association of Marriage and Family Therapists.
GSSW Service Award
This award is presented to an alumnus/alumna
who has contributed to, or served, the Graduate
School of Social Work in a noteworthy and
significant fashion, through personal effort and/
or financial contribution.
Youlon Savage, MSW ’64, ACSW, has served GSSW
in numerous ways over the years, most recently as
a member of our Board of Visitors. He is a member
of GSSW’s Advisory Council on Racial Diversity,
which advises the dean, faculty, staff and students
on planning, implementing and evaluating efforts
to improve the environment and climate of the
school relative to racial diversity. Savage’s generous
financial contributions include the endowed
scholarship fund he created in 2000. Youlon D.
Savage Scholarships are awarded to students
annually based on academic merit and financial
need.
A respected leader in Colorado mental health
care, Savage retired several years ago after a long
career as Executive Director of Adams Community
Mental Health Center. His previous honors include
a GSSW Dean’s Award, presented at the school’s
80th Anniversary Celebration last year.
Dear Fellow Graduates:
I don’t know about you, but when
I read about the incredible accom-
plishments of GSSW students and
alumni, both here and overseas,
my excitement about the future of our profession
increases even more. Whether they’re MSW students
enhancing their education through international
classes and internships, PhD students discovering
a wealth of new knowledge, or alumni making a
positive difference every day for people and commu-
nities around the world, their achievements make
me proud to be a social worker and especially proud
to say I graduated from GSSW!
It’s also heartening to see our MSW program’s
national reputation continue to grow, earning it a
new ranking in the top 11% of all accredited programs
in the country.
If, like me, you’re inspired about GSSW’s future,
I hope you’ll take a few minutes to complete our
upcoming alumni survey to ensure that the Alumni
Association moves forward in the direction you think
it should. Look for the survey postcard to arrive in
the mail soon. We’ll report the survey’s findings in
the fall issue of GSSW Magazine.
Meanwhile, please drop us an email anytime with
your ideas and suggestions, and also with Class
Notes for future issues of this magazine. We’d love
to hear from you!
Sincerely,
From the
aLumni
Jae McQueen (MSW ‘00)
Alumni Association President
aSSoCiation
preSiDent
CLaSS noteS
gssw alumni news
Patrick Pei Chwen Hu (MA, MSW ’69) of Ft. Collins, CO, sent
GSSW an autographed copy of his autobiography, lovingly
assembled by his three children as a gift for Hu’s 95 th birthday
last year. The book paints an inspiring portrait of a man who
overcame enormous obstacles to achieve his goals. Among
Hu’s earliest memories were the years of famine and nearstarvation
his family endured in China while his father tried
to support the family by farming, then the 400-mile journey
the family made on foot in the winter of 1922 so his father
could find work at a coal factory.
The kindness of American missionaries eventually led to Hu’s Christian baptism, and he
has remained deeply religious throughout his life. After earning his BA, Hu served as an
interpreter for the U. S. Army during World War II, a post that later qualified him to come to
the U. S. for graduate education. He entered GSSW in 1948, shortly before the Communist
takeover of mainland China made him literally a “man without a country”—cut off from
his family and unable to return home. Hu credits Professor Dorothea Spellmann, another
devout Christian, with helping him through this difficult time.
Hu took a break from the MSW program, earning his MA in education from DU and
holding several jobs in the U. S. and Taiwan before completing his degree at GSSW in
1969. He served as Director/Coordinator of Family Life Enrichment for Lutheran Family
Services of Iowa and as Director of St. Paul’s School for the Deaf in Macau, China, before
retiring in Colorado with his wife, Edna. “Our lives are in God’s hands,” Hu writes. “He
has plans for every one of us, even this beggar boy.”
Mel Singer (MSW ’68), LCSW, received the Most Distinguished Clinician Award from
the Colorado Society for Clinical Social Work at the Colorado Social Work Month Annual
Celebration on March 9.
Pamela Crouch (MSW ’79) retired last November after 41 years in the CO developmental
disabilities field including, most recently, 32 years at Englewood-based Developmental
Pathways, where she served as Placement Manager. Her jobs over the years included
supervising a VISTA volunteer project in the early 1970s, school social worker when the
community-centered boards provided school services for people with developmental
disabilities in the public schools, case management services and, in recent years,
management/administrative services. Crouch began at the state when the state home and
training schools (now regional centers) were being de-institutionalized and the communitycentered
services were developing. She says she enjoyed her jobs very much, but is glad to
be retired and looks forward to doing other things with her time and energy.
Patsy Hathaway (MSW ’74, MA) calls her social work story “From Jim Crow to Civil
Rights Activist.” Having grown up in the segregated south, she remembers separate
drinking fountains, segregated schools, blacks in the movie
theater balcony and ushers stationed at the doors of the
Methodist Church to keep the religious service “white.” By
the time she attended college, Hathaway had a growing sense
that this was wrong. After earning her MSW, she worked in
child protection for Denver County, then in the University
Hospital system’s pediatric clinic, JFK Child Development
Center and Kempe Center. An article she published in a
professional journal, Health and Social Work, marked the
Denver Mayor
Michael Hancock
(left) with Patsy
Hathaway’s son,
Alex Landau
beginning of her writing career.
’60s
’70s
In her late 30s and early 40s, Hathaway adopted two mixed
race children. By the time her son was in college, she’d
earned a second master’s degree in elementary education
and began teaching in inner city Denver schools. “Social
gssw alumni news spring 12 35