Knee/Wittman Outstanding Achievement

Nancy Kusmaul, PhD, MSW

Nancy Kusmaul is a professor in the School of Social Work at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. She is a prolific researcher and author, with nearly 70 peer reviewed publications addressing nursing home quality, trauma-informed care, and policy impacts on older adults and their families. She also single authored a groundbreaking policy text, Aging and Social Policy in the United States.

For over 25 years, Kusmaul has been actively involved in service provision, program development, research, and policy advocacy aimed at improving health and well-being for older adults and their family caregivers across the care spectrum. She was a 2019-2020 Health and Aging Policy Fellow, serving in the office of Senator Ron Wyden and with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

At UMBC, she served as president of the Faculty Senate from 2024-2026. In that role she advocated for faculty with university administration and collaborated with other shared governance groups. This role allowed her to use macro social work principles to support change in the university’s organization. She also regularly mentors junior faculty and doctoral students, having served on 10 dissertation committees in the last five years.

In 2024, Kusmaul received the Gerontological Society of America's Elaine M. Brody Thought Leader Award and the Congressional Research Institute for Social Work & Policy (CRISP)’s Outstanding Individual in Academia Award. She served as a reviewer for the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine’s 2022 Consensus Study Report, The National Imperative to Improve Nursing Home Quality: Honoring Our Commitment to Residents, Families, and Staff.

Kusmaul served on the board of directors of the National Association of Social Workers New York State Chapter and served as the co-chair of the National Association of Social Workers Maryland Committee on Aging from 2021-2024. She is a fellow of the Gerontological Society of America. Kusmaul holds a Ph.D. in social welfare from the University at Buffalo, a master’s in social work from the University of Michigan, and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Rochester.