Preparing students for success

Personal experiences have often guided La Salle University Assistant Professor of Social Work, Keisha Hook, MCJ, MSW, LCSW, through her career, and most recently, to a new specialty.

At La Salle, Hook teaches four classes a semester, her favorites being Generalist Practice with Families and Groups and Generalist Practice with Individuals. As a clinician and practicing social worker, Hook leads a lot of clinical classes and enjoys teaching her students how to connect and communicate with clients in the field.

Keisha Hook, MCJ, MSW, LCSW, an assistant professor in La Salle University's Social Work Program, fell in love with the profession at an early age.

Growing up in West Orange, N.J., Hook described her mom as "the neighborhood mom." Throughout her childhood she watched her mother take care of their friends and neighbors, make sure people had groceries, and provide a safe space for the local children.

"That's really social work; she doesn't see it that way, but to me that was her taking care of the community," Hook said.

When it came time for college, her mother's actions stuck with her. Hook relocated to Philadelphia to study social work at Temple University.

"I fell in love with the city and the differences of the communities and the neighborhoods and the learning of that," she said. "Social work is just so diverse, and all the things that you can do, that's what's really kept me here."

Hook earned her bachelor's and master's degrees in social work from Temple. She is currently a social work doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania and also holds a master's degree in criminal justice from Boston University Metropolitan College.

After graduating from her master's program, Hook began working as a social worker in Philadelphia. In 2021, while she was working as a clinical care manager at Community Behavioral Health (CBH), Hook first came to La Salle as a part-time adjunct field coordinator.

With the proximity to nonprofits she had at CBH, an organization that helps provide access to health and mental wellbeing services for Philadelphians, helping students find placements felt like a natural fit for Hook. Shortly after, when the opportunity arose, she became a full-time field coordinator and instructor at 20^th and Olney.

Since then, she's also served as interim chair and BSW program director and BSW practicum education director.

Prior to her instructional roles at La Salle, her teaching experience started in 2018 as an adjunct professor at Temple.

"I fell in love with it, being in the classroom, being with students and hearing about their experiences," she said.

At La Salle, Hook teaches four classes a semester, her favorites being Generalist Practice with Families and Groups and Generalist Practice with Individuals. As a clinician and practicing social worker, Hook leads a lot of clinical classes and enjoys teaching her students how to connect and communicate with clients in the field.

As well as teaching Explorers, Hook currently works at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) on the weekends, doing psychosocial assessments in the inpatient behavioral unit, and does counselling at Swarthmore College.

Hook is not just an instructor at La Salle; she is also advising freshmen for the first time this year. As a first-generation student herself, she remembers being in their shoes and knows the value of having someone to help prepare you for success.

"I love our students here and their complex lives and helping them navigate all the things," Hook said. "I love the a-ha moments, that I get even sometimes when the students say something and I'll be like, I never thought of it that way, but I can see that."

She also loves the relationships that she can build with her students.

"That big brother, big sister, Lasallian way," she said. "The community of it is my favorite part."

After sadly losing a pregnancy last year, Hook has had the chance to build a new type of relationship with one of her graduate students: a research team.

"I'm very interested in maternal health and maternal care, particularly around pregnancy loss, because I feel like it's not talked about," Hook said.

Hook had a conversation with Kaleis Henry, MA '26, about perinatal social work, and the National Association of Perinatal Social Workers (NAPSW) Annual Conference. After Henry expressed her interest as well, the two decided to team up to work on a piece of research.

They will be presenting their research, More than Skin Deep: The Invisible Scars of Black Motherhood which looks at depression, specifically in Black mothers during the perinatal period, at the NAPSW conference in April.

The faculty student research process has been nothing but positive, Hook said.

"It's always a good time watching students be passionate about something," she said, adding that it's been collaborative throughout. "It's so cool to just watch how excited she is, and this generation knows more - in school, I didn't know what perinatal social work was, and I didn't know what it was a year ago either - the students are more aware of different things and areas of focus and research."

Hook was not aware of perinatal social work until the events in her personal life. A specialty that generally encompasses the year before to up to 24 months after the birth of a child, perinatal social work is the type of work that people often come to through personal experiences, she said. Since learning more, Hook has changed her research focus to cover this specialty, even changing her dissertation topic to focus on the mental health effects of pregnancy loss.

While Hook is excited to present their research, with some nerves mixed in as well as a desire to make sure Henry also has her chance to shine, there's an annual event also coming up that encompasses why she loves teaching.

"I feel like graduation is always the proudest moment," she said, adding that after five years at La Salle, she's graduated two classes. "Seeing them from sophomore to now, and this year I'm seeing freshman that I've taught, it's like you're different, in a good way, and this is different. So being a part of seeing them grow and then being able to talk to me about what they're doing and how what we talked about in class is showing up in the field, those are always proud moments."

-Naomi Thomas