Earn your Ph.D. in Social Work from a top 16ranked school of social work. We prepare students to transform systems and policies, drive structural change, and empower individuals, families, and communities to meet their needs and interact with resource systems while deepening scholarly inquiry about the experiences of underserved groups globally.
Ranked 16th in the nation by U.S. News, Howard's Ph.D. program in Social Work is firmly rooted in a strengths-based perspective, global awareness, and social justice framework. Since its founding, the School of Social Work has been strengthening communities in Washington, D.C., through partnerships with agencies like the District of Columbia Child and Family Services Agency, Far Southeast Family Strengthening Collaborative, Central Union Mission, D.C. Public Schools, and our own Howard University Hospital. Our Ph.D. program provides a solid foundation in contemporary social work theory and community-engaged research design, deepening scholarly inquiry into the structural, sociocultural, historical, and behavioral factors that inform the individual, family, and community contexts of social issues. Our program aims to develop social work researchers, college and university faculty, policy and legislative analysts, practitioners, educators, and senior-level administrators highly skilled in designing and evaluating evidence-based policy, direct practice assessment, and interventions, while communicating their impacts. You'll benefit from a highly personalized learning environment and the close mentorship of faculty who are leading social work practitioners and scholars with research interests in child and family serving systems, positive youth development, trauma-informed care, social determinants of health, mental health, and anti-poverty policy. With Howard's premier location at the center of policymaking in Washington, D.C., you'll have access to a network of top-ranked and nationally recognized policy think tanks, research institutes, non-profits, clinical settings, and child and family-serving agencies.
