2022 Social Work SIG Board

Olga Montgomery, chair
Sarah Cheney, past chair
Helen Dempsey-Henofer
Evelyn Goldstein
Jack Jacobsen
Kat Johnson
Pam Katz
Levin Schwartz
Andrea Siegel
Hilary Stein
Kristi Stuckwisch
 

Sarah Cheney, MSW

I was introduced to ACT in 2012 at a weekend workshop in Ann Arbor, Michigan with Steve Hayes. Since then I have attended World Conferences in Minneapolis, Montreal, Dublin and virtual ones too! I am a private practitioner and owner of Modern Mind Psychotherapy in northern Michigan. I also work with people with chronic pain in a rural health clinic. I earned a master’s from Columbia University’s School of Social Work with a focus on clinical mental health. I also have a master’s degree in Rhetoric and Communication from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. I am committed to helping people in my rural and remote community as a clinical social and a community gardener – my other passion is the community garden I founded over 14 years ago and now serve as co-director. My specialties include grief, eating disorders, anxiety, OCD, and chronic pain. I use ACT with other exposure-based treatments including Maudsley Family-based Treatment (FBT) for eating disorders and Prolonged Grief Therapy. 

Jack Jacobsen, LCSW

Jack has been a clinician in private practice for the last five years, working with individuals and couples in distress. For the decade prior, he was a therapist within several local non-profit and government settings, including work with the VA and the national rollout of Integrative Behavioral Couple Therapy (IBCT). In addition to his clinical work, Jack also provides consultation and training to other mental health professionals in ACT and IBCT. He is an adjunct instructor at the Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis.

Pam Katz, LCSW

I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker practicing for 20 years. I began developing my passion for working with individuals with educational, social, and emotional needs as a school social worker for 15 years. I transitioned to private practice 5 years ago, where I work with children, adolescents, adults, families, and couples. I specialize working with individuals with anxiety, depression, ADHD, learning challenges, and trichotillomania.

I attended my first Acceptance and Commitment Therapy workshop with Steven Hayes during the fall of 2012. The training resonated with my personal and professional values. After the two day training, I continued to educate myself on the ACT framework and began applying my learnings to my professional practice and personal life. I began to teach clients to become more present to their moment to moment experience, and use interventions that were less verbal and more experiential. Since attending my first ACT workshop, I have attended several other ACT trainings and workshops to expand my skills. In addition to the Praxis trainings, I participated in a year long contextual behavioral fellowship at the University of Chicago. Furthermore, I participate in a weekly ACT mindfulness collaborative comprised of mental health therapists and occupational therapists, a twice a month ACT peer consultation group, the monthly ACT Social Work SIG book group, and the monthly ACT Social Work SIG Trainers Peer Consultation group. My desire is to participate on the SW ACT Sig Board to help recruit and support social workers in their journey, be a voice for social workers needs, and take on a larger role within the ACBS organization.

Olga Loraine Montgomery, MSS

Olga is a palliative medicine social worker residing and practicing in Richmond, Virginia. She holds a Master of Social Service degree from the Bryn Mawr College Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research. She has clinical experience to include palliative oncology, medical oncology, and hospice, as well as neurology research experience assessing patients diagnosed with Frontotemporal Degenerative conditions. Olga employs ACT in context of chronic and terminal illness as well as grief and bereavement; she has been a member of the ACBS learning ACT since 2019. Olga is passionate about whole-person clinical practice, social work ethics grounded in dignity and worth of the person, and radical self-care.

Levin Schwartz, LICSW

Levin Schwartz, LICSW received his primary training at Smith College’s MSW program and at the Veterans Administration on the Specialized Inpatient PTSD Unit. Levin’s clinical work focuses on using DBT and ACT in treating trauma and addiction. Besides his clinical practice, Levin is a musician and educator using mindfulness and acceptance skills as tools for accessing creativity and providing a vehicle to explore living in the moment and recognize barriers to valued living. Levin currently holds multiple positions in the greater community of Western Massachusetts: Assistant Deputy Superintendent at the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office, consultant to the Greenfield District Court’s Drug Court, adjunct professor at Westfield State University, Human Services Program Advisory Board at Greenfield Community College, Department of Mental Health Site Board, Transitions from Jail to Community Core Task Force and Mental Health & Public Safety Board of Franklin County.

Andrea Siegel, Ph.D., MSW Candidate

Andrea earned her Ph.D. in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at Columbia University in 2011 with a focus on Hebrew literature, Holocaust poetry, and the Arab-Israeli conflict. Experiences as a family caregiver led her to study integrative health and chaplaincy at University of Michigan, and pursue an MSW degree at Louisiana State University (graduating July 2021). Andrea has taught at University of Michigan, Pepperdine University, and State University of New York Purchase College. She was Acting Director of the Jewish Communal Leadership Program at University of Michigan's School of Social Work. She served as Director of Jewish Learning for young adults at JDC, the largest Jewish humanitarian organization in the world. Through JDC, she has taught in Ethiopia, Georgia, Estonia, Israel/Palestine, Latvia, Turkey, and elsewhere. Interests include moral injury, medical humanities, spiritually-integrated psychotherapy, caregiver support, and MHPSS in humanitarian settings. Her MSW field placement with Helping Children Worldwide focused on capacity building in Sierra Leone's child welfare sector. During her field placement, she also authored a tool that borrows techniques from Motivational Interviewing and ACT to forward the global church orphanage deinstitutionalization movement.