Plenary Speaker 

Kristin A. Day, LCSW

 The members of the 2008 Illinois Chapter Symposium Committee are pleased to announce that Kristin A. Day, LCSW, Chief Consultant, Management and Social Work Service, Office of Patient Care Services, VA Central Office has been chosen as the 2008 Symposium Plenary presenter for “Building Social Work Leadership for Tomorrow: Serving our Veterans Today.  The Symposium will take place on Friday, September 19, 2008 at the Alice Campbell Center, Alumni Center at the University of Illinois, Urbana.

Ms. Day has the overall responsibility for six programs including: Social Work, the Caregiver Support Program, the Family Hospitality Program, the Federal Recovery Coordination Program, Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom Case Management and the VA Liaison Program.  With the support of a robust Leadership Council and six national committees, Ms. Day provides policy guidance and program oversight to the field and champions an active succession planning program for the development of current and future leaders.

Ms. Day pioneered the development and implementation of VA key programs to serve returning wounded, ill and injured from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  She has forged unprecedented partnerships with colleagues at the Department of Defense, the Department of Health and Human Services, TRICARE and many other federal, state, public and private enterprises to optimize the coordination of care and benefits to service members and veterans.

Ms. Day is currently enrolled in a PhD program with Catholic University of America.  She began her dissertation work is year specializing in macro Social Work concentrating on leadership and integrating business principles into social health care administration.  She has a BSW from the University of Kentucky and an MSW from Florida State University.

Prior to the assignment she now holds, Ms. Day served as the Acting Director of Social Work and Deputy Director of VA Social Work Service.  In 2004 Ms. Day served as Chief, Social Work Service, at the VA Gulf Coast Veterans Health Care System where she successfully developed a consolidated Social Work Service with an emphasis on community integration and outcome measures based on veteran satisfaction, quality care and clinical productivity.  Ms Day’s other Social Work roles include tenure as a Mental Health Social Work Supervisor and numerous clinical assignments in such programs as Surgery, Spinal Cord Injury, Rehabilitative Medicine, a Nursing Home Care Unit, Substance Abuse and inpatient and outpatient Mental Health.