Jean Kruzich

Jean Kruzich

Associate Professor Emerita
PhD, University of Washington

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Associate Professor Jean Kruzich, who began teaching at the School in 1991, is retiring at the end of the 2018–19 academic year. During the past 28 years, Dr. Kruzich made significant contributions in research, scholarship and teaching, and with her deep understanding of organizations and administration, she has been a tireless champion of School staff. 

Her expertise in organizations and human services management was applied with great success, as well, to the child welfare service sector. With the School’s Alliance for Child Welfare Excellence, she played a major role in developing and implementing a simulation training method that is now being incorporated into front-line and supervisory training. After her retirement, she’ll continue to work as a faculty consultant with the Alliance as well as with Partners for Our Children.

Dr. Kruzich has served in many roles at the School. She was the lead instructor of the MSW Foundation Organizational Practice course and served as the long-standing chair of the Administration concentration and co-chair of the Admin-Policy Practice concentration. Under her leadership, new core Admin courses were developed, such as Strategic Management and Change Leadership. She also developed a popular elective, Collaborative Community-Based Program Evaluation, that gives students the opportunity for an applied curriculum where they can support a local organization’s evaluation activities. Jean’s teaching expertise was recognized with her receipt of the Students' Choice Teaching Award in 1997. 

She earned an MSW from the University of Minnesota in 1975, and the following year, received an MPA from the Hubert Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. In 1982, she received her PhD in social work from the University of Washington. 

With both a social work and public affairs background, her areas of interest are wide-ranging. They include social service management, organizational and environmental influences on provider behavior and client outcomes, and the interface of child maltreatment and substance abuse.

A prolific author, Dr. Kruzich contributed book chapters, book reviews and articles, including numerous papers written in collaboration with her School colleagues. In 2006, she received the Slavin-Patti Award for Scholarly Excellence for a sole-authored article which was chosen as the outstanding article in Volume 29 in the Administration in Social Work Journal. Her exceptional scholarship was also recognized by a special merit award presented by the American Psychological Association.