Faculty Members
Faculty in the School of Social Work hold a diverse array of research and teaching interests. The brief faculty profiles below provide a snapshot of these areas of expertise. More information is provided on individual faculty pages.
Interim Dean
Elected College Member, Royal Society of Canada
Tel: (709) 864-7940 Rm: J-2019
Email: sgiwa@mun.ca / deansocialwork@mun.ca
Research interests: forensic social work; critical race and anti-Black racism; race and sexuality; LGBTQ+ migration, settlement, and integration; intersectional stigma and human rights; minority stress and coping; queer of colour critique; critical analysis of whiteness; critical social work theories and pedagogy; and the criminal justice system (police and corrections). For more detailed information see Dr. Giwa's faculty page.
Associate Dean, Graduate Programs and Research
Acting Associate Dean, Undergraduate Programs
Tel: (709) 864-8688 Rm: J3019
Email: pissahaku@mun.ca
Research interests: domestic violence and intimate partner violence; children, youth & family services; social policy processes; ageing and older persons; community development; and program evaluation. For more detailed information see Dr. Issahaku's faculty page.
Full Professor
Associate VP (Academic) and Dean of Students
Tel: (709) 864-2985
Email: avpas@mun.ca
Research interests: social work education; interprofessional education; service delivery systems in higher education; and community capacity building, with an emphasis on youth. For more detailed information see Dr. Hardy Cox's faculty page.
Full Professor
University Research Professor
Tel: (709) 864-2555 Rm: J-3018
Email: blefrancois@mun.ca
Research interests: the intersections between the sociology of childhood, critical childhood studies and Mad Studies; sanism, queerness and subversion; transdisciplinairty and in/disciplinarity; (mad) social movements, social activism and (mad) social anarchist practices; autoethnography, critical ethnography and participarty research; critical disability studies; and, critical whiteness studies. For more detailed information see Dr. LeFrancois' faculty page.
Full Professor
Vice-Provost (Equity, Diversity and Inclusion)
Tel: (709) 864-2181
Email: dmullings@mun.ca / viceprovostedi@mun.ca
Research interests: decolonizing post-secondary education; mothering and parenting; mental health and wellness in the Black church; racialized LGBTQ+; Black and racialized elders; settlement and integration in small urban centres, rural and remote areas; employment discrimination; and human rights policy. For more detailed information see Dr. Mullings' faculty page.
Associate Professor
Interim Associate VP (Indigenous Research)
Tel: (709) 864-4512 Rm: J-2003
Email: pbanahene@mun.ca
Research interests: social justice education; Black parenting experiences; social work theories; social work interviewing skills; Indigenous African philosophies and their pedagogical possibilities; spirituality as self-care; integration and resettlement experiences of people of African descents; and violence and non-violence education. For more detailed information please see Dr. Adjei's faculty page.
Associate Professor
Tel: (709) 864-2554 Rm: J-3001
Email: cdeboer@mun.ca
Research interests: identity development and transformation; disengagement studies; social work practice (specifically therapeutic relationships and counselling); and narrative studies, including narrative theory, analysis and therapy. For more detailed information see Dr. de Boer's faculty page.
Associate Professor
Tel: (709) 864-2559 Rm: J-3020
Email: sellenbogen@mun.ca
Research interests: child welfare; social work education; public engagement social perceptions; human development, behavioural & emotional problems; gambling; and life course transitions. For more detailed information see Dr. Ellenbogen's faculty page.
Associate Professor
Tel: (709) 864-7701 Rm: J-2009
Email: csmith13@mun.ca
Research interests: mental health and addiction; substance use and harm reduction; risk behavior among people who inject drugs; foregounding the expertise and experiences of People who Use Drugs; Critical Drug Studies; and substance use education in Social Work curriculum across Canada. For more detailed information see Dr. Smith's faculty page.
Associate Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8161 Rm: J-4011
Email: gwideman@mun.ca
Research interests: gerontology; aging in rural places; palliative care in rural communities; social work with military families; and community engaged scholarship and research. For more detailed information see Dr. Wideman's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8151 Rm: J-2009
Email: fandersen@mun.ca
Research interests: Indigenous community capacity building; Indigenous ways of knowing, Indigenous knowledge translation and mobilization; action outcome co-creation of community-based, community-driven research with, for, and by Indigenous communities; promoting Indigenous communities’ ways of knowing and healing; anti-colonial social work practice, including its relevance for Indigenous communities; promotion of equitable partnerships and honouring of traditional knowledge; Indigenous circle pedagogy; and team and group work. For more information see Dr. Andersen's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8147 Rm: J-4004
Email: agoulden@mun.ca
Research interests: reproductive health and justice among disabled populations; sex-positive social work education and practice; sexual well-being among disabled people; healthcare decision-making among youth populations; young parenting in the child welfare system; universal design for social work education and practice; and service user and carer involvement in social work education. For more detailed information see Dr. Goulden's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8583 Rm: J-3021
Email: jjanes@mun.ca
Research interests: community-based participatory research; arts-informed, collaborative approaches to social work; critical gerontology; critical race, whiteness, post structural and anti-colonial theories; decolonizing epistemologies and methodologies; intersections between environmental and social justice; ableism/sanism; harm reduction; and community practice. For more detailed information see Dr. Janes' faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-4716 Rm: J-3022
Email: kdejong@mun.ca
Research interests: critical mental health service delivery to 2SLGBTQIA+ youth and their providers; the lived experience of youth service users and how they have experienced the embedded heteronormativity in the service system; understanding how service providers experience the same and what they do to try and mitigate its impact; creating a safer and more inclusive mental health service delivery system for all children, youth and their families regardless of gender and sexual expression/identification. For more information see Dr. de Jong's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8381 Rm: J-4012
Email: smcconne@mun.ca
Research interests: field and social work education; decolonization, reconciliation, and Indigenization; gender and sexual diversity; and preventing, disclosing, and ending violence and abuse. For more information see Dr. McConnell's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-2562 Rm: J-3002
Email: lpacheco@mun.ca
Research interests: reproductive justice and mothering with a disability: intersection of parenting with an intellectual disability and the child welfare system; structural and intimate partner violence against women with disabilities; intersecting identities and social justice; aging and neurodiversity; critically reflective practice and community engagement; narrative inquiry; critical discourse analysis; participatory approaches to research; and roles of professionals, accessibility of services and the critical examination of professionals’ power and privilege within the health and social service system. For more detailed information see Dr. Pacheco's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-8150 Rm: J-4005
Email: jparsons@mun.ca
Research interests: marginalization; oppression; poverty; social class; gender; identity; social inclusion; lone mothers; welfare; social work education; and social work supervision and research ethics. Her work employs anti-oppression, feminist, and postmodern perspectives and qualitative research designs. For more detailed information see Professor Parson's faculty page.
Assistant Professor
Tel: (709) 864-7516 Rm: J-4010
Email: sshaikh@mun.ca
Research interests: connections among social justice practice, organizational and community change and social policy from the standpoint of activists and social workers; critical social work; social policy; social justice praxis; critical research; community engagement; organizational change; social service administration; antiracism; advocacy and activism; intersectionality; environmental and social justice; families; disability; feminist theory; global migration; diaspora; decolonizing and anti-colonial knowledge production; professional ethics; and sociology of professional knowledge. For more detailed information see Dr. Shaikh's faculty page.