The Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice at the University of Chicago hosted its annual African American Alumni Committee (AAAC) Social Justice Talk on February 19.

The event, titled “They Definitely Not Like Us: Advancing Racial, Social, and Cultural Equity in an Era of Unprecedented Challenges,” covered several key issues faced by the community: social justice, healthcare, and institutional integrity, highlighting the evolving risks and challenges encountered by marginalized communities.

The event was moderated by Eugene Robinson, Jr. (A.M. ’09), director of Black student success at the Chicago Public Schools’ Office of Equity. He was joined by panelists Gina E. Miranda Samuels, a professor at Crown; Marshanelle Horne, a family medicine nurse practitioner and CEO of Thrive Life Wellness Center in the Chicago area; and Decoteau J. Irby, assistant professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

The event focused on key community-related issues, with each panelist highlighting concerns affecting their communities due to recent governmental changes headed by the Trump administration.

The conversation progressed with panelists expressing their thoughts about the newly implemented anti-DEI policies under the Trump administration and examining how these policies are affecting academia. Robinson noted how scholarships intended for minority groups have already been impacted: “[The Illinois State Board of Education] has a minority teacher scholarship program, which is under attack currently,” he said.

Samuels echoed this sentiment, noting that a lot of civil rights legislation has been used to uphold white supremacy, particularly in academia.

“I think now we just see, in addition to using laws that were intended to upend white supremacy to protect white supremacy… we’re seeing also the language of the civil rights movement, social justice movement being used to protect white supremacy,” Samuels said.

Additionally, Samuels noted affirmative action as a strong example of this phenomenon, explaining that, in reality, it has benefited “white women more than any other group.”

“Black people on this campus, in terms of faculty—tenure-track faculty—make up [a small] percent… If there was some opening of the doors and selective gates of all of this, this room would be way more packed, right?” Samuels continued. “And you would have a lot more choice than you had in terms of inviting faculty, Black faculty, to sit up here, right? So I think we’ve got to call their bluff.”

Horne, for example, spoke about the challenges healthcare providers face under the Trump administration, which reduced government subsidies for the healthcare industry in line with Trump’s goal of cutting government spending.

The dialogue then shifted toward how Trump’s policies are affecting the healthcare industry. Horne highlighted the challenges that healthcare providers have faced when navigating workplace pressures under the Trump administration.

“[Under the Trump administration], there’s a lot of services that are not going to be covered, that people were getting covered with their state insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, and that affects a person’s overall quality of health,” Horne said. “Some of these treatments that people were getting are no longer going to be covered. So what do we do about that? Do we just stop treatment if overall, it affects somebody’s outcome… their health care?”

According to Horne, these disparities are why he started practicing independently.

“[Since becoming independent,] what I found is most people don’t even understand health insurance—they can’t even tell you what a deductible is or if their deductible is met. So how can you expect these same individuals to understand executive orders and how that’s going to affect their health care?”

To address this issue, Horne hopes to implement education initiatives that help people better understand how their insurance options may or may not change under new executive orders and empower them to make more informed healthcare decisions. However, she also acknowledged the challenges faced by healthcare providers, such as providing equitable access in a timely manner to patients in need.

“We are pressured [when] working for these large organizations to say, ‘Hey, if a person schedules an appointment for hypertension, you have 15 minutes,’” Horne said. “If they have six people on your schedule in one hour… [that’s] 10 minutes a person. How can you be able to address all of the needs?”

These financial constraints are also seen in social work education, according to Samuels, who noted that social work education faces tremendous challenges due to clashes between academic institutions’ financial approaches and the ethics inherent to social work. Samuels recalled something a colleague in social work had said recently: “I really don’t think that schools of social work were meant to be in universities because we can’t fully be social workers and [do] social work in… a university.”

The conversation also underscored the importance of understanding executive orders and their direct impact on both healthcare and social policy. Both Robinson and Horne emphasized directly reading executive orders rather than relying on interpretations. Irby argued for reform in communication channels, such as choosing face-to-face discussions and phone calls over digital communication for sensitive topics to be addressed effectively.

Horne outlined his strategy for balancing ethical concerns with newly issued executive orders: “My first approach is to understand the laws, the guidelines, understand my scope of practice, you know, to make sure that I’m practicing in a manner that I should be practicing legally,” he said. “I [ask], ‘What is the scope of practice for a nurse practitioner?’… And I lean on ‘do no harm’ to guide my practice. I don’t think about what the executive order said and things like that.”

“I’m practicing the same that I’ve been practicing: being an advocate for my patients, being able to find them the resources that they need, referring them when they need the referrals,” Horne said. “If they do run into any trouble because of these different laws and executive orders, it’s my duty and my job to be able to help them to get around those things.”

The panelists went on to highlight broader institutional challenges affecting their communities, such as the long-term effects of executive orders on educational curricula and instructional planning, as well as the crucial role of social work in this environment.

“I think what it takes is a level of courage and commitment… a dedication to things like social justice and the dignity and worth of all people and all of our social work values,” Samuels said. “I think a lot of times, we feel strongly about but don’t always necessarily practice in moments like this, and I think it’s going to take some incredible courage and stamina to fight for this and to take heat for it and not be popular.”

Ultimately, the panel highlighted the need for continuous, active involvement in policy changes and emphasized the significance of ethical practice in healthcare and education.