Suzanne M. Schunk has been the vice president of Family Support Services at Southwest Human Development since 2000. Her department includes Healthy Families (child development and child abuse prevention parent support program), Parents Partners Plus (Maricopa County centralized home visitation program), Direct Support Services (support for families with a child who has a behavioral health diagnosis) the New Beginnings Program (groups for divorcing parents), and a full array of child welfare programs including: In-Home Services (Family Preservation, Parent Aide, and Family Reunification), Foster Care and Adoption, Kinship Care and Adoption, and the Interstate Compact for the Placement of Children.

Prior to coming to Southwest Human Development, Suzanne was the CEO of Family Services Agency in Elkton, Md. for 14 years. An Arizona-licensed clinical social worker, Suzanne has more than 35 years of experience providing mental health and child welfare services to children and families and she was an expert witness for courts in three states, as well as a clinical consultant for several programs in Maryland. Her areas of expertise include child welfare, Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another, family mental health, domestic violence, professional documentation, and critical incident stress debriefing. She has provided professional training for more than 25 years and has presented at many state-wide conferences, as well as the National Association of Social Workers’ 2014 national conference.

Suzanne earned her bachelor’s degree from Fordham University in Bronx, N.Y. and her master’s degree in Social Work from Catholic University in Washington, D.C. She earned the “Infant Family Specialist Certificate” from the Harris Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Training Institute in 2006. She has been a field instructor with seven different colleges and is currently affiliated with Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University and the University of Southern California schools of Social Work. Suzanne is actively involved in the National Association of Social Workers – Arizona Chapter (NASW-AZ) where she is a past president of the Board of Directors. In 2005, she was honored as the Arizona Chapter’s “Social Worker of the Year”. In 2014, Suzanne received the “Hope Award” from Prevent Child Abuse Arizona and the “President’s Award” from NASW-AZ.

Suzanne represents Southwest Human Development on the Child Welfare Committee of Children’s Action Alliance and serves as the treasurer for the Protecting Arizona’s Family Coalition Board of Directors. She is active in advocacy on legislative issues affecting programs for children and families.