Biography
Dr. Petracchi’s primary scholarly interests lie in improving the professional delivery of social work services to vulnerable populations. To this end, she has focused on identifying the service needs of vulnerable populations, and instituting and evaluating innovations in educational delivery strategies to more effectively prepare social work students for practice. As part of her work with vulnerable populations, Dr. Petracchi coauthored a state of the region report (with Dr. R. Engel and K. Brown, 1999) and a book, The Hmong in America: Providing Ethnic-Sensitive Health, Education, and Human Services (with Dr. K. McInnis and M. Morgenbesser, 1990). Her work has also published in the Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare as well as the Wisconsin Medical Journal.
Early on, Dr. Petracchi’s explored the rapid growth of distance education programs in social work education with the intent of assessing the instructional quality of distance learning. Articles on these topics have appeared in several peer reviewed journals including the Journal of Social Work Education, the Journal of Teaching in Social Work, Research on Social Work Practice, The Journal of Baccalaureate Social Work, the Journal of Continuing Social Work Education, and the Journal of Computers in Human Services. Dr. Petracchi has also coauthored a chapter in Information Technologies: Teaching to Use—Using to Teach (with Dr. M. Patchner and S. Wise) and an article, “Techno-Presence in Pennsylvania Public Child Welfare Agencies: Implications for Continuing Education” appears as a CD-rom publication (sponsored by the National Association of Social Workers and the Council on Social Work Education, 1999). Most recently, Dr. Petracchi’s research has focused on service-learning pedagogy in social work education; in combination with the civic engagement movement in higher education. Dr. Petracchi has evaluated service learning in a living-learning community at the University of Pittsburgh (articles under review). Based on these findings, her current study, “An Assessment of Service Learning Activities in CSWE-accredited Social Work Programs” is designed to:
1. Examine the extent to which service-learning is a required component of social work education in accredited social work programs nationwide;
2. Identify the ways service learning is incorporated into accredited baccalaureate and graduate curriculum; and,
3. Assess perceived benefits which may accrue to students engaged in service learning.
Dr. Petracchi’s research and practice experience are reflected in the courses she teaches in all three programs at the School of Social Work. Dr. Petracchi has taught social welfare policy in both the BASW and MSW programs as well as generalist methods courses, seminars at both the undergraduate and graduate level and residential treatment to MSW students. In the PhD Program Dr. Petracchi created and teaches a course on social work education. Additionally, Dr. Petracchi advises baccalaureate, masters, and PhD students.
Dr. Petracchi was selected as a Faculty Associate (2009) and a Chancellor’s Diversity Fellow (1999). She has also received Letters of Commendation for her teaching from the University of Pittsburgh Office of the Vice Chancellor (2000, 1998, and 1996), and has been nominated to Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers eight times (2009, 2008, 2006, 2005, 2002, 2000, 1998, and 1996).
Selected Publications
Petracchi, H.E., Weaver, A., Kolivoski, K.A., Das, R. & Engel, R. (In Press). An assessment of service learning in a university living-learning community: Implications for community engagement. Journal of Community Practice.
Petracchi, H.E. & Mallinger, G. (In Press). Generalist Practice. In N. Van Den Bergh (Ed.). Teaching Generalist Practice: A Compendium of Model Syllabi. Alexandria, Va.: Council on Social Work Education.
Petracchi, H.E.& Collins, K.S. (2006). Utilizing actors to simulate clients in social work student role plays: Does this approach have a place in social work education? Journal of Teaching in Social Work, Vol. 26 (1/2), pp. 223-233.
Petracchi, H.E., Mallinger, G., Engel, R., Rishel, C., & Washburn, C. (2005). Evaluating the efficacy of traditional and web-assisted instruction in an undergraduate social work practice class. Journal of Technology in Human Services, Vol. 23 (3/4) pp. 299-310 (simultaneously co-published in Web-Based Education in the Human Services: Models, Methods, and Best Practices. Robert J. MacFadden, Brenda Moore, Marilyn Herie, Dick Schoech (Ed.) The Haworth Press, Inc.).
Petracchi, H.E. (spring, 2003). A survey of county public child welfare agencies: Implications for distance learning. Professional Development: The International Journal of Continuing Social Work Education, Vol. 5(3), pp. 29-36.
Petracchi, H.E. & Patchner, M.A.. (September, 2001). Student performance in three classroom settings: An evaluation of distance education. Journal of Teaching in Social Work, Vol. 21(3/4), pp. 27-36.
Petracchi, H.E. & Patchner, M.A. (January, 2001). A comparison of live instruction and interactive televised teaching: A two-year assessment of teaching an MSW research methods course. Research on Social Work Practice, Vol. 11(1), pp. 108-117.
Petracchi, H.E. & Patchner, M.A. (Spring/Summer, 2000). Social Work Students and Their Learning Environment: A Comparison of Interactive Television, Face-to-Face Instruction, and the Traditional Classroom. Journal of Social Work Education, Vol. 36(2), pp. 335-346.
Petracchi, H.E. (2000, May). Distance education: What do our students tell us? Research on Social Work Practice, Vol. 10(3), pp. 362-376.