2024: The Future is Now!

Imani: ID: A black woman with long, dark haired locs wearing a full length blue dress with printed flowers and birds paired with grey sneakers and a knee length black coat. Imani is posing outside on a sidewalk in front of various trees and bushes; Leah: ID: A 40ish mixed race Sri Lankan, Irish and Galician nonbinary femme with curly brown silver and purple hair, lying on a couch looking at the viewer horizontally. They have rose gold aviator frames, thick eyebrows, red lipstick and sand colored skin, and are looking at the viewer with a kind of tired but hopefully crip wonder. They wear a blue denim vest with a pin that says Neurodivergent Universe above a pink and blue image of a ringed planet, and a black tank top with yellow lettering that read Talk To Plants, Not Cops is barely visible. They have a tattoo of the words "We begin by listening" in magenta cursive script on their left arm.; Sami: D: A black woman smiling proudly at the camera with short, curly dark hair and red lipstick, wearing dark rimmed glasses, sparkly rainbow dangle earrings, and a yellow V-neck top.

2023: Centering Disability Justice

2022: Radical Hope in a Racialized Society

Michelle Alexander seated at 2019 conferece

2021: Are You Ready to Answer the Call?

Friday, January 26, 2024 & Friday, February 2, 2024

The 2024 Social Workers Confronting Racial Injustice Conference on Friday, January 26th and Friday, February 2nd (12:00-3:30PM CST each day). The theme of this year’s conference is The Future is Now!

Highlights include:

  • The Importance of Racial Justice and Liberatory Practice: What We Do and Why We Do It with Shimon Cohen and Charla Cannon Yearwood from Doin’ The Work, which provides education, training, and support to individuals and groups interesting in healing and justice work. Streaming January 26, 12-1:30PM (CST).
  • How Much Discomfort is the Whole World Worth with Kelly Hayes, a Menominee author, organizer, movement educator, photographer and co-author of the best-selling book Let This Radicalize You, with Mariame Kaba. Streaming February 2, 2-3:30PM (CST).

This conference supports social workers by challenging us to change our work and root our action in radical conceptions of justice. Through our learning together, we hope that this conference will inspire us all in our work, our organizations, and our society.

The conference is free to attend and we offer CEUs/CEHs. All sessions will provide captioning/CART services. If you need another accommodation or have questions, email Abbey at confrontinginjustice@socwork.wisc.edu.

The conference website will be updated with details on breakout sessions as they arrive. Recordings of past conferences are available on YouTube .