A Tribute to Shirley Jenkins

It is with deep sadness that we announce Dr. Shirley Jenkins, Founding director of the Center for the Study of Social Work Practice, died of cancer on December 30, 1991. In this issue of Practice & Research, those who knew her best, both personally and professionally, recall Shirley, Jenkins.

Born Shirley Presberg, Shirley received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Brooklyn College, her Master of Arts degree from Columbia University, and her doctorate from New York University. Her early carrer focused on international affairs, serving as Associate Editor of the Far Eastern Surveyand as a Political Officer in the United Nations Secretariat. The first of her ten books, published in 1954, was entitled American Economic Policy Toward the Philippines. In addition to her later work related to New York City and child welfare issues, she maintained an international perspective, editing Social Security in International perspective in 1969. Her last book in 1988, Ethics Associations and the welfare State, reported on a study of services to immigrants in the United States, Great Britain, Israel, Australia and the Netherlands.

Shirley Jenkins began teaching at the Columbia University School of Social Work in 1964. When she retired after 25 years as Professor of Social Research in 1989, she had already accepted the Directorship of the Center for the Study of Social Work Practice. At CUSSW, she achieved an international reputation, particularly for her studies of the foster care system's effects on children and parents, and studies of ethnicity and social services. She contributed to the literature regarding research methodology in social work, directing a number of major research projects concerning family and children's services, as well as studies which examined the relationship between ethnicity and social welfare. Shirley also completed other studies during sabbaticals a the Paul Baerwald School of Social Work at Hebrew University and the Graduate Center at City University of New York, and during her employment as a researcher at the Community council of Greater New York.

In addition to her research and teaching at the School of Social Work and elsewhere, Shirley Jenkins was active in University-wide affairs, serving on the University Senate for three terms (including as a Vice President of its Executive Committee), the Presidential Commission on the Future of the University, the Executive Committee of Faculty, and the University Institutional Review Board (including two terms as chair). She servered on many local, state, and national committees and panel, regarding community services as an essential part of an academic career.

Shirley received particular satisfaction from her work with doctoral students, especially as Director of the CUSSW National Institute of Mental Health funded Research Training in Social Work and Mental Health program, which she initiated in 1977. During her more than ten years as Director of this program, she served as mentor to, and advocate for, many aspiring social work researchers who are mow making substantial contributions to the field.

It is difficult to pinpoint when Shirley began work on developing the Center for the Study of Social Work Practice. Long concerned with the divisions between practice and research in the profession, she believed that forging a stable, on going link between a university and a social work agency would bridge the gap more effectively than ad hoc arrangements. The Jewish Board of family and Children's Services, with its breadth of services and long time close affiliation with the Columbia University School of Social Work, seemed the obvious choice. From the beginning, Shirley saw the Center as truly a joint effort, and she provided leadship in operationalizing this by developing and sustaining the Center's first studies. She worked tirelessly, despite her illness, to complete the Center's early publications, and to ensure that the Center's first major conference, Research and Practice: Bridging the Gap, held on March 8, 1991. was successful. From her bed at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, she dictated introductory remarks remarks read at the conference, which have been published in the July 1992 special issue of research on Social Work Practice.

Shirley Jenkins was committed to making a difference in the field of social welfare, and ultimately for those in greatest need of service. Her writing, research, teaching, service activities and founding of the Center maintained a sharp focus on this goal throughout her carrer. With the most profound respect, we remember Shirley Jenkins.