Letter From the President:

Welcome to the 2019-2020 School Year!

Now in my second year as SSWAN President I am even more excited about the future of our organization! We grew our membership last year, and with the combination of new social workers with enthusiasm and fresh ideas - and our more seasoned members with a lifetime of experience and wisdom - we continue to move forward in a positive direction.

An ongoing goal of ours is to increase our visibility across the state. We compiled information from a survey of SSWAN members and produced a flyer that gave a snapshot of what school social workers do across the state. This was shared with administrators during School Social Work Week in March and can be found HERE. We are also looking at who employs school social workers and the ratio to students in different districts.

Our Engagement Committee has two new co-chairs who are energetic and are hitting the ground running in finding new ways to engage current members and recruit new ones. The Legislative Committee continues to track important legislature, inform membership, and advocate for anything related to school social work. Our Conference Committee has already started planning our Spring Conference and will once again bring in superb speakers and presenters on topics that directly pertain to us.

Feel free to peruse the site, follow us on Facebook, and reach out to any of the Board Members if you have any questions about SSWAN or School Social Work. We look forward to hearing from you!

Emily Arkfeld

SSWAN President

Bellevue Public Schools