From the Director
Assessing Progress at New Year's
By Elizabeth J. Clark, Ph.D., ACSW, MPH
 Beginning
is a relevant term, and the phrase "new beginning" has
personal significance for each of us. Some of us mark a new year
by our birth date. Teachers and parents with school-age children
may use the school year as their annual marker. Administrators
refer to the fiscal year or budget year, as opposed to the calendar
year.
While there are some cultural and religious differences (for
example, the Chinese New Year or the Jewish New Year), most of
us in this country celebrate January 1 as "the" New
Year. This date serves as a demarcation between years and decades
and centuries. Each Jan. 1, we look back on the previous 365 days
and do an assessment of our progress. Sometimes we are glad to
see a difficult year end. Other times we are reluctant to bring
closure to a special chronological age, a great decade, or even
a millennium.
Since this column appears in January, it seems like a fitting
time to take a look at the events that were special or significant
to NASW in 2005.
Last year was the golden anniversary of the founding of NASW.
We celebrated 50 years of progress and outstanding leadership
for both NASW and the profession. On March 17, we held the 50th
anniversary gala using a 1950s theme. We also celebrated the founders
and pioneers of NASW with an October event. October was chosen
because the actual charter of NASW was signed on Oct. 1, 1955.
There was also a coming together of the profession at the Social
Work Congress in March. This resulted in a set of imperatives
that will guide the profession for the next decade (see www.socialworkers.org/congress/imperatives0605.pdf).
We developed a traveling exhibit to highlight the important contributions
of NASW during that past half century, and we published a book
about NASW presidents called Celebrating 50 Years of Leadership.
We also embarked on a national public education campaign called
"Social Workers. Help Starts Here," and the calendar
year ended with a social work video message broadcast in Times
Square in New York City.
There has been much to celebrate.
Yet, 2005 was not without its tragedies and difficulties. There
were terrible natural disasters that affected some of our chapters,
many of our members, and social work colleagues around the world.
We were once again reminded of the disparities in the lives of
many of our fellow citizens and people in other countries.
We remain concerned for our social work colleagues affected by
hurricanes in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. Yet,
we have been comforted by the generosity of our members who contributed
almost a quarter of a million dollars to help social workers begin
to rebuild their lives and practices so that they can help rebuild
the social services safety nets in their communities.
We wish the very best of "new beginnings" to these
colleagues, and to each of you we wish a very happy New Year.
To comment to Elizabeth J. Clark: newscolumn@naswdc.org
From January 2006 NASW News. © 2006 National
Association of Social Workers. All Rights Reserved. NASW News
articles may be copied for personal use, but proper notice of
copyright and credit to the NASW News must appear on all copies
made. This permission does not apply to reproduction for advertising,
promotion, resale, or other commercial purposes.
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