Meredith Powers

Brief BIO 

Dr. Meredith C.F. Powers (she/her) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Social Work at UNC Greensboro, in North Carolina, USA. She is an affiliate faculty with Geography and Environmental Studies and a faculty Co-advisor for Social Work Student Organization 

Dr. Powers teaches, facilitates community-engaged, action-research, and has co-authored and co-edited a growing body of open-access scholarship on topics of climate justice, climate migration, ecosocial worldviews, eco-therapeutic practices for healing especially through collaborative art, ecosocial work, and justice, equity, diversity and inclusion. She presents her research locally, nationally and internationally at professional conferences, including being invited as a keynote speaker at the United Nations for World Social Work Day (2018). Dr. Powers is the founding Director of the Climate Justice Program of the International Federation of Social Workers. With this role, she also produces and co-hosts a new podcast project, JAM Sessions. She established and co-administers the global Green / Environmental Social Work Collaborative Network. Her local, community-engaged, action research projects include: “Parks for All People”, for the extensive enhancement of outdoor recreation spaces; “Climates of Inequality: Stories of Environmental Justice”, focused on global and local climate migration and resettlement; and, most recently, “All That We Share”, an inclusive, community public art project that serves to enhance the community as we celebrate diversity and strengthen our bonds to each other and our environment. 

Education 

• Ph.D. University of South Carolina, School of Social Work 
• M.S.W. UNC Chapel Hill, Certificate in Non-profit Management, Certificate in International Development and Social Change 
• B.S.W. UNC Wilmington 

Courses Taught 

• Environmental Justice 
• Work with Communities, Groups and Organizations 
• Social Work and Social Justice 
• Issues and Trends in Social Work 
• Social Work, Diversity, and Vulnerable Populations 
• BSW Internship Seminar and Agency Liaison 

Research Interests 

• Climate Justice 
• Art and Nature-based therapeutic activities for individual, community, and planetary healing and wellness