GSSW alumni Christine Guzman (at left in photo) and Pam DeLazaro both earned their MSW degrees in 1995 and still remain close friends. Coincidently, both have careers in international social work.
Guzman, a resident of Sierra Madre, CA, is the Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) Field Director at Azuza Pacific University. In 2005, along with a faculty member from Lithuania Christian College, she developed a course entitled "Understanding International Social Problems and Services through Study Abroad." Every two years, Guzman takes students to Lithuania to study about public policy and social services in Eastern Europe.
Serving a global society
The goals of this learning experience, she says, include considering the applicability of global solutions to domestic social problems and confronting students' values concerning social welfare and ways of meeting social needs.
"We have become a global society," Guzman explains. "It is our responsibility to equip students with practice skills and personal development opportunities on an international level." An example, she notes, is the comment one of her students made on his course evaluation: "For the first time," he wrote, "I know what it's like to be a foreigner [and] a minority."
Making international adoptions click
DeLazaro, of Highlands Ranch, CO, is an adoption social worker for Chinese Children Adoption International, the largest international adoption agency in the country. Previously, she also worked with families adopting from other countries such as Guatemala, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Ethiopia.
DeLazaro says she works on behalf of both the children and the adoptive parents to ensure the best possible adoptions. Once prospective parents have been screened, she works with them to ensure that they can make well-informed decisions. DeLazaro also helps parents understand the Chinese culture and the degree to which the children?s birth mothers are "still in their heart." This includes making "life books" with the children that include their pictures from China, their tickets to America and other memorabilia. Such activities are vital, DeLazaro explains, because if the children are not aware of their culture and birth families, they often make up their own stories, which can be emotionally unhealthy.
Among DeLazaro's favorite aspects of her work has been the chance to accompany a group of families on their trip to China to pick up their children. "Once these parents meet their children, they are their children," she says.
