Sam Harrell, PhD, MSW

Sam Harrell, PhD, MSW (they/them) is the BSW Program Director and an Assistant Professor at Seattle University. Sam's practice experience spans many fields, including child welfare, prison and jail re-entry, low-barrier shelter services, LGBTQ+ youth services, violence prevention, legal advocacy, and crisis intervention. They received their BSW and MSW from Indiana University and their PhD from Portland State University. Sam has taught across the curriculum at several universities and enjoys teaching research, history, and community practice. Sam is a first-generation college student from Kentuckiana determined to make higher education welcoming and meet learners where they are. Sam's scholarship is rooted in prison industrial complex abolition and anarchist values. Their research examines social work's relationship to the criminal legal system, mandated reporting, and child welfare. Sam is an Editorial Board member for the journals Affilia: Feminist Inquiry in Social Work and Abolitionist Perspectives in Social Work.