| Title: |
Term Faculty College Associate Lecturer |
| Dept: | Social Work |
| Office: | CB 326 |
| Phone: | 216-687-3564, 216-645-1555 |
| Fax: | (216)687-5590 |
| Email: | M.A.DOVER@csuohio.edu |
| Address: | 2121 Euclid Ave. CB 326, Cleveland, OH 44115 |
Education: | ||
|
B.S., Social Work, Adelphi University, 1978
M.S., Social Work, Columbia University, 1980 M.A., Sociology, University of Michigan, 1996 Ph.D., Social Work and Sociology, University of Michigan, 2003 | ||
| Brief Bio: | ||
| The first item on my resume is that I was a community organizer organizing tenants for a Community Action agency in New York City's Chelsea neighborhood in 1975-1976. After five years of pre-M.S.W. community organizing, group work and casework experience in New York City, 1975-1980, I worked for ten years directing trade union-based member assistance programs in New Orleans, New York City and Philadelphia, as part of the early employee assistance field. Since 1982, I have also maintained a continuous affiliation as a part-time or full-time faculty member, faculty advisor, field instructor or graduate student instructor at eleven social work schools and programs in New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia, Michigan and Ohio.
In 1991, I began doctoral studies at the University of Michigan in social work and sociology, passing preliminary examinations in both social work and sociology and completing a dissertation co-chaired by faculty from social work and sociology. While I was a student, I co-parented my two children, worked as an admissions counselor, instructor in social work and in sociology, teaching assistant for two Detroit Area Study research projects, research associate at the Institute on Labor and Industrial Relations, and research assistant in child welfare. Finally, during those years, I was a recipient of a five-year Fellowship in Applied Aging from the National Institute of Aging. Work begun as a doctoral student related to human needs and to the roles of oppression, dehumanization and exploitation in producing injustice have been subjects of my published work within social work. For a CSU Media Site interview related to human needs, please see: http://tinyurl.com/y7torxn I am an Ohio native, born in Alliance and partially raised in Maple Heights. My mother's family was directly descended from the Armstrongs and Stanleys who settled the Western Reserve in 1803. In the early 1920, my paternal great-grandmother and grandmother brought my father from Memphis and its surrounding agricultural areas to Akron and then Cleveland, where he graduated from West High School. My late parents met before WWII at Kent State and married following the war. These deep Cleveland and Northeastern Ohio family roots affected my choice of Ohio for my dissertation research. My dissertation in Social Work and Sociology at the University of Michigan was based on four years of research in Toledo and at the Ohio Historical Center in Columbus, as well as visits to fifteen other Ohio cities including Cleveland. It was titled "The Social System of Real Property Ownership: Public and Nonprofit Property Tax Exemptions and Corporate Tax Abatements in City and Suburb, 1955-2000." I explored whether the growth of post-industrial complexes of public, nonprofit and religious property in our urban areas has had unintended negative consequences for the tax base of our urban schools and governments. I concluded that the growth in the proportion of property value which is exempt was the result of de-industrialization and population shifts that resulted in a lower rate of growth in the value of taxable property in our cities compared to our suburbs. The growth of exempt property has made our cities important regional centers of health, education and culture, but that consideration should be given to compensating cities for hosting these complexes of exempt property (as is done in one other state to a limited extent.) I have presented the theory of my dissertation at the 2010 meeting of the American Sociological Association, and I am working on a book to be titled, "Devoted Property: A History of the Real Property Tax Exemption in City and Suburb." | ||
| Creative and Activities: | ||
| At least once a year, I creatively seek new ways of catching, kissing and releasing smallmouth bass. I also creatively seek to find new ways of not losing golf balls in the woods. In 2010, I took up yoga and practice regularly. I am an avid film buff, and most recently saw Bresson's Diary of a Country Priest at the Cleveland Institute of Art's Cinematheque. Finally, I still have several dozen copies of a new reprint of my story, Pooh and Party Look for Haycorns and Discover Christmas, available upon request. | ||
| Research Interests: | ||
| In his final presidential address to the graduating class, President Michael Schwartz called upon CSU faculty to study the content of justice, the nature of human nature, and the history of our free institutions. I have research interests in each of these three areas.
All of my theoretical and empirical work is united intellectually by a commitment to using sociological theories originating in the work of Durkheim, Weber and Marx to engage in institutional, organizational and class analysis of dehumanization, oppression and exploitation. My dissertation and current book project study the history of an important social institution: the property tax exemption for public, nonprofit and religious property. That institution has stimulated the development of our mixed economy, one characterized by a strong free market sector but also by stable and secure exempt sectors for government, charity, education, culture and religion. The property owned by those sectors is free from the taxation which would force its owners to operate entirely according to market principles. However, in order to think critically about the possible implications of the growth of these sectors, my work used theories based in institutional and organizational analysis of the ways in which large organizations often externalize costs onto the rest of society. In my work on the content of justice, in 2008 I published an original theoretical typology of the relationship of three important sources of injustice of concern to social work: oppression, dehumanization and exploitation. Each of these three sources of injustice can inhibit the ability of people and communities to meet their human needs in a way that is consistent with their human rights and with their culturally valued way of life. After all, perhaps the most important characteristic of human nature is the manner in which human beings strive to meet our uniquely human needs, needs which are universal but which are met in a myriad of culturally specific ways. Trained as a social worker, a sociologist and a gerontologist, I am particularly interested empirically in the manner in which older people meet their human needs across different cultures. I am finding that Cleveland State University is wonderful place to engage in research and creative activity within a rich urban environment, in an historically important region of the country. I strongly support the stated goal of President Ronald M. Berkman for Cleveland State University to emerge as a premier urban research university. To such a goal, I plan to devote the remainder of my career as a social work educator and social work and sociological researcher. | ||
| Teaching Areas: | ||
| My teaching interests and experience involve teaching social policy, social research, micro and macro human behavior theory and community practice. I have a growing interest in teaching about theories of generalist and advanced generalist practice and in theories of social work practice for global social work education. I am interested in teaching as part of an interdisciplinary focus on human needs. I am very happy to have been on the full-time faculty at CSU since August 2007! | ||
| Professional Affiliations: | ||
| National Association of Social Workers (since 1976)
American Sociological Association (since 1991) Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action (since 1991) Urban Affairs Association (since 2000) Council on Social Work Education (associate since 1996, full member since 2003) Association for Community Organization and Social Administration (since 1996) Urban History Association (since 2008) Social Science History Association (since 2000) Social Welfare Action Alliance (founding member, 1985) | ||
| Professional Experience: | ||
| Post-MSW Positions Held:
Social Worker, DC-37 AFSCME Legal Services Fund Social Worker, Bucks County Housing Group, Langhorn, Pennsylvania Director, Faculty/Staff Assistance Program, University of Pennsylvania Clinical Director, The Assistance Program, Philadelphia AFL-CIO Director, Medical/Psychiatric Social Work Service, Service Employees International Union Local 32B-J Health Fund, New York, NY Regional Coordinator of Personal Services, National Maritime Pension and Welfare Plan, New Orleans, Louisiana Pre-MSW Positions: District 65-UAW Personal Services Unit - Social Work Intern 1979-1980 and Summer Social Work Employee 1979 and 1980 Social Work Intern, Harlem Hospital Division of Child Psychiatry Family Assistant, N.Y.C. Board of Education Division of Special Education Counselor, Educational Alliance Project Contact Residence Social work intern, Community Service Society C.A.U.S.E. Program, New York, NY Housing Blockworker and Organizer, Chelsea Action Center, New York, NY, 1975-77 | ||
| University Service: | ||
| Current service (see vita for past service)
Member, Bylaws Committee, School of Social Work Minute taker, Joint MSW Program Faculty advisor, NASW Student Club McNair Program: Disciplinary Mentor to two McNair Scholars Active member of the Policy Sequence | ||
| Professional Service: | ||
| Current Professional Service (for previous service, please see vita):
Fall 2011 to Present: Member, Legislative Committee, National Association of Social Workers, Ohio Chapter Fall 2009 to Present: Member, Regional Leadership Team, National Association of Social Workers Ohio Chapter | ||
| Community Service: | ||
| Fall 2010 to Present: Co-Conference Coordinator, Cuyahoga County Conference on Social Welfare (March 4, 2011 at CSU; March 2, 2012 at CSU). For further information, see: http://tinyurl.com/27pmmmf | ||