Crystal Aschenbrener is the department chair of the social work program at Alverno College, which she helped to develop. The effort involved working with national social work accreditation requirements and state licensure processes, with which she has become quite familiar. She began teaching at Alverno in 2017, and teaches courses including social work programs and services, human behavior and the social environment, social work practice courses, and Native American service and research. Her primary goal is to ensure social work students are successfully able to meet the social justice needs of the Milwaukee and surrounding area and beyond.
Aschenbrener recently helped launch a substance abuse counseling program at Alverno, and is currently working on developing a Master of Social Work program. She oversees several college committees including the Social Work Advisory Board; the Substance Abuse Counseling Task Force Committee; the Recruitment, Outreach and Leadership Committee; the Positivity Committee; the Social Media and Leadership Committee; and the Annual Field Trip Committee.
Prior to teaching, Aschenbrener had 12 years of social work field experience. A licensed social worker with 13 years of university teaching experience, Aschenbrener is the program coordinator of the Today & Beyond Program. The program introduces college students to tribal culture, traditions and strengths, as well as the historical trauma and social problems facing Native Americans. Each year she and her students travel to a tribal school to work with junior high students, helping motivate them for high school, college and beyond. Her field experience includes work with individuals, families, groups, organizations and communities.
Aschenbrener earned her Bachelor of Social Work from the University of South Dakota, Vermillion. She earned her Master of Social Work from the University of Kansas, Lawrence, and her Doctor of Social Work from Aurora University in Aurora, Ill. She is a member of the National Association of Social Workers at both the state and national levels, and the Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors Association. Aschenbrener is also a member of the Indigenous Tribal Social Work Educators’ Association’s Task Force Committee with Council on Social Work Education, the Diversity Committee for the National Association of Social Workers, the Council on Social Work Education, and the board of the National Mentoring Resource Center with the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.
