Friendship and Race

From The Chronicle of Higher Education What Facebook Tells Researchers about Friendship and Race

College freshmen are more likely to make friends with peers they share a dorm room or major with than they are to befriend those from similar racial backgrounds, a study on the Facebook profiles of first-year students found. A paper on the study, which will be published next week in the American Journal of Sociology, was conducted by researchers at Harvard University and the University of California at Los Angeles. They tracked the online profiles of a class of 1,640 students at an unnamed university to see how they chose their friends. ... Although sociologists have long believed students are drawn together by race, the study suggests they are much more likely to become friends with people they see more often or those who make friendly overtures. “There is a high degree of racial homogeneity in friendship networks, but a lot of it is generated by other ways in which friendships are formed,” said Andreas Wimmer, a professor of sociology at UCLA who led the study.

New CRS Report on Poverty

Poverty in the United States: 2009 - Thomas Gabe, Specialist in Social Policy, September 20, 2010 This is an excellent starting point for data and research on poverty in the United States.

Major Child Welfare Groups Unite to Call for Reshaping Priorities in US Adoptions

From the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute: An extensive examination of adoptive families in the United States, released today, concludes that too many are not receiving the essential services they need, and calls for a reshaping of national priorities and resources to develop and provide such services. Read more...

The Riveting Rescue of 33 Chilean Miners: An Act of People, Leaders and Good Governance

From the Brookings Institute: Chile’s successful efforts are not an anomaly or a fluke. For years, the country has been among the top rated emerging economies of the world in terms of its quality of governance. In fact, Chile's governance rating is superior to a number of rich industrialized economies, placing around the top 30 countries in the world (see figure below, from the just-released Worldwide Governance Indicators). Read More...

The Moral Imperative of Social Work Advocacy

By Frederick Reamer, Phd One of social work’s distinguishing features is its explicit emphasis on social justice issues. In addition to the inspirational language concerning social justice included in the Code of Ethics preamble, the code also includes several specific standards concerning social workers’ ethical duty to address broader public policy issues that are germane to clients’ lives. Read more...