Joe Squillace
Associate Professor, Director of Social Work Programs
Social Work Program

Joe Squillace, Ph.D., MSW, is an Associate Professor and Director of the Social Work Programs at
the University of St. Mary of Leavenworth, Kansas. He is the author of numerous scholarly
and advocacy publications covering social work education, health care access and Medicaid,
and dental and mental health care for children. Most recently, he authored the book
A History of the Morgan County Poorhouse and Farm, which received a Certificate of
Excellence in 2018 from the Illinois State Historical Society. Between 2011 and 2020,
he was the Director of the BSW Social Work department at MacMurray College. He received
the Dewey Excellence in Teaching Award in 2017 from MacMurray College. In 2011 and
2008, he received the Excellence in Teaching Award from the BSW and MSW student associations
at Saint Loui s Univer sity, where he taught from 2001-2011. In 2001, he received
the Missouri Association for Social Welfare Advocate of the Year Award, St. Louis
Chapter, and a Health Care Financing Administration Beneficiary Services Certificate
of Merit in 2000.
As a practicing social worker, he has been a policy analyst, advocate, lobbyist, nonprofit
manager, and direct service practitioner. He drafted the Comprehensive Children鈥檚
Mental Health Services System legislation that passed the Missouri legislature in
2005, as well as legislation to prevent the relinquishing of child custody for mental
health services, and for the provision of oral health care services delivered by dental
hygienists in public health settings. His media advocacy on these issue areas has
been covered by Time magazine, the Washington Post, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the
Kansas City Star, and many other media markets.