Dr. Elizabeth (Liz) Lightfoot's Personal Page

Elizabeth Lightfoot is Director and Distinguished Professor of Social Policy at the Arizona State University School of Social Work, a role she assumed in 2021. Her research focuses on disability policy and services, specifically how disability intersects with child welfare, aging, abuse, and systemic health disparities. She has conducted extensive studies examining how parents and children with disabilities navigate the child welfare system, and her research findings have directly informed national disability policy.

In addition to her core disability policy research, she has published extensively on social work doctoral education, global health and international social work, aging and family caregiving, macro practice and organizational policy, and community-based asset mapping. She has received funding from a variety of federal, state and foundation sources for research, including the US Department of Health and Human Services, US National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research, and the Department of Agriculture, 

Her global work includes sabbatical years as a Fulbright Scholar in Namibia and Romania, and she served as the discipline of social work's first Fulbright U.S. Scholar Alumni Ambassador. Prior to joining ASU in 2021, she spent 23 years at the University of Minnesota School of Social Work as a Global Distinguished Professor. During her time there, she directed the PhD program for 15 years, created an MSW field placement program in Namibia, and developed new specialized MSW tracks in community practice, international social work, and health, disability, and aging.

Lightfoot is a deeply committed teacher and mentor. She teaches doctoral courses in research methods and social policy, as well as MSW courses in disability, policy, and macro practice. She has advised 27 PhD students to completion, mentors scholars globally, and frequently consults with universities in the United States and internationally on developing and strengthening social work education.

She is an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare and has received the Group for the Advancement of Doctoral Education’s Educational Leadership award. She has served as the President of the Group for the Advancement of Doctoral Education in Social Work and has been on the boards of the Society for Social Work and Research, the Council on Social Work Education and the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.