Richard Cooper

Richard M. Cooper, PhD, MSW

  • Director of the BSW Program and Co-Coordinator African American Studies
Media Expertise:
  • Race
  • Social Justice
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Affiliated Programs

Education

  • PhD, Urban Education (2002)
    Temple University (PA)
  • MSW, Social Work Practice (1984)
    Howard University (DC)

About Me

I have a working class background and was raised in semi-rural Chester County, PA. I was drawn to activism and social change buttressed by the Civil Rights Movement and a desire to engage in the work that addressed oppression and racism directly. Social work for me is a calling. I seek to prepare students to cogently discover and articulate their future work/mission for a myriad of practice opportunities in the field.

My goal is to improve and develop students' knowledge bases and skill sets. But more importantly, I teach them to become change agents and to understand the value and importance of the work that we undertake. For me it is an honor and a privilege to closely interact with students on their educational sojourns.

Research Interests

My research interests are culturally centered educational pedagogy, therapeutic methodological frameworks, healing, counseling agency-based practice, and emancipation-oriented paradigms for African Americans and other disempowered populations.

Media Expertise

  • Social work clinical practice and counseling
  • Socio-political issues regarding African Americans
  • Adolescent and youth popular culture
  • racism
  • African American music
  • Domestic polices
  • Initiatives from President Obama
  • Black history
  • Black males
  • Hip hop culture and R&B music
  • Culture diversity
  • Movie reviews

Publications

  • Cooper, R.M., Groce, J.T., & Thomas N.D. (2003). Changing direction: Rites of passage programs for African American older men. Journal of African American Studies, 7(3), 3–14.
  • Cooper, R.M., & Caucus, B. (1998). African-centered social work supervision: Moving from African-centered theory to Africana social work practice. Journal of the National Association of Black Social Workers.

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