Entertainment Media Outreach

In 2009 NASW reinvigorated the NASW Communications Network (NCN) to help the social work community critique and influence the entertainment media industry. NCN was first created in the late 1980s by NASW Past President Suzanne Dworak-Peck to refer social work content advisors to television writers and producers. The re-launched NCN seeks to continue this successful outreach model, while expanding it with the power of social media interactivity.  We also have invited representatives from all areas of the profession (practice, research, policy, education) to participate as experts and advisors.  
  
In November 2009, NASW launched a blog-driven website called Social Workers Speak! to engage social workers in a two-way conversation with the news and entertainment media.  The site offers an easy way for social work pros to weigh-in on many television programs, films and news stories that cover or depict social issues and social workers. The site’s content includes advance notice of new programming, interviews with media industry insiders, and hundreds of insightful social worker comments on postings.  More than 500 people posted responses and 10,000 visited the site in its first two months.

NASW also began a formal partnership with the Entertainment Industries Council and hosted a successful media forum—“Picture This: Women’s Health”— in Washington D.C. in May 2009. Media panelists representing popular TV dramas, music programs, and reality shows joined experts from more than 40 Washington-based policy groups who work on women’s issues.  The goal was to explore new ways that producers and writers could depict important women’s health issues to entertain and inform.  A follow-up report was sent to hundreds of entertainment industry professionals as a creative resource.

To continue this important outreach, NASW will focus this year on promoting experts in the NASW Communications Network directly to relevant TV programs.  We also want to draw more entertainment and news media professionals to the SocialWorkersSpeak.org site to hear what social workers have to say about their work and key issues of the day.

Contact for SocialWorkersSpeak.org:
Greg Wright at gwright@naswdc.org or  202.336.8324