News and Events
Celebrating Zelda Program Founding Director Dr. Susan Gerbino
Over her 30 years of service to NYU Silver, Dr. Susan Gerbino has been a Clinical Professor, founding Coordinator of the Westchester County Campus, Founder and Director of the Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care (Zelda Program), and a beloved, teacher, mentor and colleague. On September 23, 2024, current and former students, Zelda Program fellows, faculty and staff, funders, friends and family gathered to celebrate Dr. Gerbino on her retirement.
Photovoice: A Creative Breather
In the spring of 2022, two years into a challenging pandemic, the Zelda Foster Studies Program collaborated with Annie Levy, BFA, LMSW, to offer Zelda community members the opportunity to “take a creative breather” and come together to reduce stress and isolation by having a shared experience. Annie Levy specializes in using a myriad of forms of Participatory Communications to engage and equip people in sharing their experiences, including Photovoice, which was used in our project.
Participants in our Photovoice project met three times with the photographs they took for each session centered on themes integral to palliative and end-of-life care: Affirm Life, Relief from Pain, and Integrating Psychosocial and Spiritual Aspects Into Care. No photographic experience was necessary, and the group consisted of Zelda alumni from all three of our standing programs: the Leadership Fellowship, the MSW Fellowship, and the Post Master’s Certificate in Palliative and End-of-Life Care. Click through to see a few examples of the work submitted.
Leadership Fellow Amy Corveleyn Named AOSW 2022 Oncology Social Worker of the Year
Leadership Fellow, Amy Corveleyn, MSW, LICSW, the Program Manager for Massachusetts General Hospital’s Collaborative Care and Community Engagement Program, received the Association of Oncology Social Work (AOSW) Oncology Social Worker of the Year award at the association's annual conference, which took place from June 15-17, 2022 in Raleigh, NC. In addition, 19 Zelda Foster Studies Program fellows and mentors presented at the conference and were there along with program leadership to cheer Amy on.
Zelda Foster Studies Program at SWHPN 2022
More than two-dozen fellows and mentors from our Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care were among the honorees and presenters at the 2022 Social Work Hospice & Palliative Care Network General Assembly from April 24-26, 2022 in Santa Fe, NM.
Zelda Foster Studies Program Leadership Fellow Becky Cammy Named Cambia Health Foundation Sojourns Scholar
Becky Cammy, MSW, LCSW, a class of 2017 Zelda Foster Studies Program Leadership Fellow, was selected to be part of the eighth cohort of the Cambia Health Foundation Sojourns® Scholar Leadership Program. The Manager of Social Work for the oncology service line at the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, Becky is one of ten emerging palliative care leaders chosen for the 2022 cohort through a rigorous selection process from a highly competitive national pool of candidates from a range of disciplines and practice settings.
Zelda Foster Studies Program Awarded Samuels Foundation Grant to Advance Provision of Palliative Care for Older Adults
NYU Silver’s Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care has been awarded a three-year, $150,000 grant from the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation for a project that aims to advance the provision of palliative care services to older adults.
Under the grant, NYU Silver will recruit and admit four DSW students over the next three years, selected for their commitment to providing palliative care to older adults in New York City as well as their need for financial assistance in order to pursue their doctoral education. Each will be awarded a $20,000 scholarship from The Samuels Foundation matched by a $10,000 scholarship from the Zelda Foster Studies Program. These Samuels Doctoral Fellows will be charged with co-facilitating one Adaptive Leadership Lab in 2022-23 and another in 2023-24, which will identify adaptive leadership challenges in palliative care and work to generate solutions. Four to six MSW alumni of the Zelda Foster Studies Program who work in palliative care agencies in New York City will be recruited and trained to participate in each Adaptive Leadership Lab. In addition, each of The Samuels Doctoral Fellows will be required to focus their DSW capstone project on some aspect of older adult palliative care and disseminate their findings via journal articles, books, chapters, conference presentations, and/or research.
Celebrating our Fifth Cohort of Leadership Fellows
On October 18, 2021, the Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care held a virtual Poster Presentation in which nine new graduates of the program’s Leadership Fellowship presented their capstone projects on substantive areas of palliative and end-of-life (PELC) leadership that contribute to the knowledge base of the field.
The normally 18-month fellowship provides a select group of experienced PELC social workers from across the country with 30 hours of intensive training at NYU Silver and one year of individual mentorship with a PELC social work leader. The aim of the fellowship is to improve PELC for patients and families through the development of a cadre of MSW PELC leaders.
For this cohort of fellows, which began in Fall 2019, the fellowship stretched an extra six months due to COVID-19. As PELC social workers, the fellows have been on the front lines of the pandemic from the start, and several changed their capstone projects mid-stream to address new PELC challenges the pandemic has posed. In completing their capstone projects, the graduating fellows showed extraordinary perseverance and dedication to those they serve.
Please join us congratulating the fellows, who are listed with their mentors and the titles of their capstone projects in the event program at http://ow.ly/vLFp50GuaMQ.
Zelda Foster Studies Program Receives Grant to Provide Bereavement Training to NYC Social Workers
The Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care has been awarded a $25,000 grant from the Y.C. Ho/Helen & Michael Chiang Foundation to provide free bereavement training to 100 social workers at New York City social services agencies, giving priority to those that are serving communities of color and marginalized populations hit hardest by COVID-19.
Zelda Foster MSW Fellow Rachel Rusch Named Cambia Health Foundation Sojourns Scholar
Rachel Rusch, a class of 2016 MSW graduate and MSW Fellow in Silver’s Zelda Foster Studies Program, was selected to be part of the seventh cohort of the Cambia Health Foundation Sojourns® Scholar Leadership Program. A clinical social worker within the Division of Comfort and Palliative Care at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA), Rachel is one of twelve emerging palliative care leaders chosen for the 2020 cohort through a rigorous selection process from a highly competitive national pool of candidates from a range of disciplines and practice settings. She is the second Zelda Foster Studies Fellow to be selected for this prestigious program since it was opened to social workers in 2018, following in the footsteps of Bridget Sumser, MSW ’12.
Drs. Susan Gerbino and Esther Chachkes Advance Palliative and End-of-Life Care in Singapore
Zelda Foster Studies Director Dr. Susan Gerbino and Mentorship Program Director Dr. Esther Chachkes spent nine days in Singapore during January 2020 as Health Manpower Development Plan (HMDP) Visiting Experts on Palliative, End-of-Life, Grief, and Bereavement Across the Care Continuum. Together, they met with key leaders and presented lectures, seminars, and workshops for social workers as well as doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals at Singapore's National University Hospital (NUH), Alexandra Hospital, Singapore General Hospital (SGH), Tang Tock Seng Hospital, and Assisi Hospice.
A Year of Honors for Our Zelda Foster Studies Community
The 2018-19 academic year has been particularly fruitful for NYU Silver’s Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care, with nine fellows, mentors, and faculty receiving significant honors, and three collaborating to edit a seminal textbook on palliative care social work, which was published in winter 2019.
Meredith Ruden, MSW '09, DSW '18, Launches Foundation to Support Parents with Cancer
Dr. Meredith Ruden, who distinguished herself in the inaugural cohort of Zelda Foster Studies MSW Fellows and the inaugural class of NYU Silver's DSW program, founded The Feather Foundation, which provides online emotional, financial, and practical support for parents with cancer, upon earning her DSW in May 2018. In November 2018, she left her position as an oncology social work program coordinator at Mount Sinai Hospital, which she held throughout her DSW studies, to devote herself full-time to her role as President of the foundation.
Zelda Foster Studies Program Has Big Presence, Impact at SWPHN 2018 General Assembly
NYU Silver’s Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care (PELC) played a significant role at the Social Work Hospice & Palliative Care Network (SWHPN) 2018 General Assembly, with presentations by 31 Zelda Foster fellows, faculty members, mentors and certificate program graduates.
Yanette L. Tactuk, MSW '11, Honored with Patient Advocacy Award
Yanette L. Tactuk, MSW '11, received the 2018 Patient Advocacy Award from Centers Health Care. Tactuk, who also holds a Post-Master's Certificate in Palliative and End-of-Life Care from NYU Silver's Zelda Foster Studies Program, is a clinical social worker at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC).
"Yanette provides immense support during the challenging situations that face all her patients," said Penny Damaskos, Director of Social Work at MSKCC. Damaskos, who is also a Zelda Foster Studies Leadership Mentor, was recently honored herself by the HealthCare Chaplaincy Network.
Rebecca Cammy, MSW, LCSW, Receives Best Article Award
Rebecca Cammy, a 2017 graduate of NYU Silver's Zelda Foster Studies Leadership Fellowship, has received the Journal of Social Work in End-of-Life and Palliative Care’s 2017 Best Article Award.
The award-winning article is based on the capstone project Cammy completed as part of her fellowship. She will be recognized at an awards ceremony on March 12th at the Social Work Hospice & Palliative Care Network General Assembly.
Summer Institute in Primary Palliative Care, July 17-21, 2017
Training in Culturally Congruent Care for the Deaf/Hard of Hearing/DeafBlind Community
With generous funding from the Ernst & Paula Deutsch Foundation, the Zelda Foster Studies Program has launched a unique and innovative three-day course in the skills, methodologies, interventions, and sensitivities needed to provide culturally congruent care to Deaf, Hard of Hearing, and Deafblind (D/HH/DB) clients, their families and health care providers.
Association of Oncology Social Work (AOSW) 33rd Annual Conference | May 31 - June 2, 2017
Zelda Foster Studies Program Receives Samuels Foundation Grant to Train Geriatric Professionals in Palliative and End-of-Life Care
NYU Silver’s Zelda Foster Studies Program in Palliative and End-of-Life Care has been awarded a $38,000 grant from the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation to provide primary palliative care training to social workers and other professionals working with older adults in New York City.
Zelda Foster Graduates Honored at SWHPN
The Social Work Hospice and Palliative Care General Assembly convened on March 6-8, 2016 in Chicago, and this year’s theme was Promoting Integrated Care For Serious Illness: Improving Access, Coordination and Psychosocial Outcomes. From the NYU Silver Zelda Foster community, 24 graduates presented, winning a total of six awards.
Palliative Care and Hospice Social Worker Qualification Training and Continuing Education Advanced Program in Hefei, China
Kim Roberts (MSW ’17) Named First-Ever Student Member of the Society for Social Work Leadership in Health Care’s National Board
Silver School student Kim Roberts (MSW ’17) has been appointed to the national Board of Directors of the Society for Social Work Leadership in Health Care (SSWLHC), the premier organization for healthcare social workers, as its first-ever student representative.