Two social workers have been selected to serve as 2014 Practice Change Leaders for Aging and Health, a national program that works to develop, support and expand the influence of organizational leaders who are committed to achieving transformative improvements in care for older adults.

The social workers are Cindy Tack (photo left), director of care coordination at the MMC Physician-Hospital Organization in Portland, Maine; and Amy Turk (photo right), chief program officer at the Downtown Women’s Center in Los Angeles.

According to Practice Change Leaders, the program is a one-year opportunity for participants to gain enhanced leadership skills and content expertise to positively influence care for older adults. Leaders complete a project aimed at integrating improved care for older adults within their organization, allowing them to remain at their full-time job throughout the program.

The projects will serve as an important vehicle for “hands-on” learning of critical and transformative leadership skill development.

Tack’s project title is Interdisciplinary Care Management Program Integration, while Turk’s project is called Medical Homes for Older Adults.

The program is jointly supported by the Atlantic Philanthropies and the John A. Hartford Foundation.

M.C. “Terry” Hokenstad, professor of Global Health Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences Case Western Reserve University, gave the inaugural lecture of the establishment of the Global Institute of Social Work in November.

Hokenstad attended the institute’s opening ceremony in Singapore, where it was announced that he is the honorary president of GISW. While there, he also conducted a workshop on active aging at SIM University.

Ngoh Tiong Tan, dean of the School of Human Development & Social Services at SIM University, is leading the GISW, which aims to deliver quality social work training through a web portal.

“This is in the beginning stages,” Hokenstad explained. Professor Ngoh Tiong Tan is in the process of gathering courses and material from different sources. The information will be vetted and then customized for local cultural context, he said.

“There are many countries that have people performing skills similar to social work, but they lack formal social work training,” Hokenstad said. “This is a way to reach them.”

Ngoh Tiong Tan may be reached at gisw@thegisw.org.

Mary Pulido, executive director of the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, has been named the president of American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children-New York Chapter.

The APSAC was founded in 1987 and is a nonprofit national organization that focuses on meeting the needs of professionals engaged in all aspects of services for maltreated children and their families.

Especially important to APSAC is the dissemination of state-of-the-art practice in all professional disciplines related to child abuse and neglect.