Fellows

Mark Courtney is a Professor in the School of Social Service Administration. His fields of interest include child welfare policy and services, the connection between child welfare services and other institutions serving marginalized populations, and the professionalization of social work. His most influential scholarship has involved a series of longitudinal studies of youth making the transition to adulthood from state care and experimental evaluations of interventions intended to improve the well-being of these young people. 

 Professor Courtney is an affiliated scholar of Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago, which he served as Director from 2001 to 2006. He has also served on the faculties of the University of Washington (2007-2010) and the University of Wisconsin (1992-2000). He was the founding director of Partners for Our Children (POC), a public-private partnership housed at the University of Washington devoted to improving child welfare services. POC received the 2008 American Public Human Services Association Award for Academic Excellence. Professor Courtney received the Distinguished Career Achievement Award from the Society for Social Work and Research in 2015 and the 2010 Peter W. Forsythe Award for leadership in public child welfare from the National Association of Public Child Welfare Administrators. He was also named Social Worker of the Year in 2000 by the Wisconsin Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers.

 Before moving into academia, Professor Courtney worked for several years in various capacities providing group home care to abused and neglected adolescents. He has served as a consultant to the federal government, state departments of social services, local public and private child welfare agencies, and the philanthropic community.