As does the profession of Social Work, the African American church has a long history of taking active roles in helping communities in times of social change. Given this commonality and because the African American church has repeatedly demonstrated what could reasonably be considered successful macro social work, it is believed that social workers would benefit from being informed about African American church community involvement from a macro social work perspective. The concept is explored through a discussion of African American Church Social Entrepreneurship as a macro social work response to African American community gentrification.

Social service agency directors are responsible for hiring social workers that have the knowledge and skills to serve vulnerable children and families. However, there are public social service agencies that employ social workers who do not have degrees in social work. While there are many reasons for hiring decisions, this study focuses on the views of 185public social service agency directors on hiring social workers with degrees in social work. For those directors who agreed that social workers should have degrees in social work only one theme emerged, this theme emphasized that social workers with accredited degrees in social work have specialized knowledge and skills that go beyond training and work experience. The overall findings from this study may be useful to aspiring social service agency directors, supervisors, educators, and mentors.