Dr. Joyce Bialik is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Columbia University School of Social Work (CUSSW).  She began teaching courses in sociology while studying for her Ph.D. in Social Welfare at Wurzweiler School of Social Work. Her dissertation title is “Men Dealing with Fatherhood and Poverty.”  Bialik received her Ph. D. in 2008, the same year she won a student prize for a paper based on her dissertation at the Society for the Study of Social Programs. She followed this paper with a second one at the Council on Social Work Education.  In the last several years she has taught social welfare policy, the history of social welfare, and social welfare research in the social work programs at Hunter and Lehman Colleges of the City University of New York.

Dr. Bialik’s fields of practice are social welfare and workforce development. In over 30 years with New York City government Bialik functioned as a community organizer, researcher, and policy practitioner. In 1999 she was in the center of major changes in the City’s administration of public assistance. Preparing to enhance the work first component of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (a/k/a welfare reform) the City transferred Workforce Investment Act funds from Bialik’s agency to the Human Resources Administration (HRA) as well as several managers, Bialik included. Her experiences at HRA in the early years of welfare reform influenced Dr. Bialik’s decision to pursue a doctorate and subsequently to teach social welfare in schools of social work.

Last updated August 04, 2009.