A Full Circle Community Campaign
Fellowship
for Good.
Lighting. Carrying. Passing the torch. A cycle unbroken.
Twenty years in the work. A doctorate in progress. A community called in — because the cycle demands it, and the students deserve it.
Join the Fellowship →The Story
Twenty years in the margins.
Now building from a new vantage point.
For two decades, this work happened inside the system — in schools, in hallways, in communities where young people were brilliant and simply needed someone to stay long enough to prove it.
That work was always rooted in one conviction: student brilliance is worth protecting. In recovery high schools and university classrooms. In buildings where resources ran dry and families needed more than a counselor — they needed an advocate.
That work has not ended. It has evolved. As founder of Counselor & Concierge® and an active doctoral student at the University of Southern California, this chapter is being built in public — and the community is being called in to make it possible. The story does not end here. It continues through every person the work reaches next.
Not as a charity. As a fellowship. Because the work that comes next belongs to all of us.
The Conviction
The Arc
Breaking out.
Building what
should have
existed from
the beginning.
For decades, the profession of social work has faced a quiet but deliberate dismantling — deprofessionalized, underfunded, treated as supplemental rather than essential. The message from the system has been consistent: this work doesn't warrant the investment.
Twenty years of practice made that lie impossible to sustain. Every year given. Every framework built. Every student whose brilliance was protected — the work and the field's collective advocacy proved the lie wrong, year after year.
This is the breaking free. The intentional departure from a system that was never built to sustain this work or the people doing it. The doctoral journey at USC is not a continuation of the same grind. It is the foundation of something different. Something built from the beginning with the right intention.
The vision is not to repeat the cycle of brokenness. The vision is to get to the place — through research, through practice, through this degree — where student brilliance is protected from the start. Where young people don't have to survive a broken system before someone shows up for them. Where the work begins at the beginning, not in the aftermath.
That is what this fellowship funds. Not just a degree. More than a way forward — a cycle unbroken.
Call and Response
They were there.
Hear their words.
Sherann Alkins, LICSW
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From Sherann
This is the work.
Twenty years of showing up. A doctorate to earn. A community to call in. Hear it directly — what this fellowship is, why it exists, and where it is going.
The torch does not pass itself. It takes a village, a circle, a scholar, an advocate, a griot. It takes the community showing up — the way the community was always shown up for.
Join the Fellowship →Your story
belongs here.
Contribute at any tier and receive a personal invitation to add your voice to this wall.
The Evidence
Twenty years of
receipts.
Three Degrees. One Direction.
B.S. Sociology & Human Services, Springfield College. M.S. Social Work & Social Administration with a Minor in Law, Columbia University School of Social Work. CAGS in School Administration, American International College. Every credential pointed toward the same thing: young people.
Springfield Federal Courthouse
Invited to speak at the Springfield Federal Courthouse to present a successful self-harm decrease model — advocating for minority students being denied care. Shifted the conversation from abstinence to harm reduction. Publicly. On the record.
Liberty Preparatory Academy · 2006–2015
Nine years serving students living with substance use disorders. Twice promoted to Interim Assistant Principal. Built recovery support programs, harm reduction frameworks, and the Restoring Hope Conference for NASW — centered on writing, emotional health, and healing.
Professor · Four Universities
Adjunct Professor of Social Work at Springfield College (2006–2010), Westfield State University (2011–2015), Simmons College (2016–2020), and Boston University (2019). Teaching graduate-level students real-world practice and systems thinking — while doing that work in the field simultaneously.
Director & Principal · ABCD University High School · 2015–2025
Dual role as nonprofit director and high school principal of an alternative learning community that supported over-age and under-credited students in Boston. Secured grant funding to support a workforce development pathway that connected students and their families to community resources — removing barriers to learning while supporting them in earning their high school diploma on a workforce development pathway.
Licensed. Certified. Credentialed.
Massachusetts LICSW · Licensed School Social Worker · Licensed Principal & Assistant Principal · DESE SEI Endorsement · CAGS in School Administration · Certified Mentor Supervisor, Big Brother Big Sister NYC · Supervisor in Field Instruction, BSW/MSW Programs · Member, National Association of Social Workers
Founder & Principal Consultant · 2024–Present
After two decades inside the system, a new one was built. Counselor & Concierge® supports school counseling teams through coaching, professional development, and equity-anchored frameworks — youth-centered, trauma-responsive, designed to sustain the adults who sustain the students.
USC Doctor of Social Work · 2026–Present
Active doctoral student in one of the nation's most rigorous social work programs. Research focus: healthy development for all youth and harnessing technology for social good. Nine semesters. Nearly $100,000. No sufficient federal funding. That is why this fellowship exists.
15 Years. Public Service. Loan Forgiveness.
This is the villain arc made visible. Fifteen years carrying the weight of graduate-level debt — while doing the very work institutions claim to value. The deprofessionalization of social work is not abstract. It is a practitioner financing her own expertise while the system underfunds the pipeline. That debt is finally gone. This degree will not rebuild it. The fellowship exists precisely because no one doing this work should have to choose between the mission and the means.
Family
I carry the titles of wife, daughter, sister, friend, niece, and most important — mother of two neurodiverse children. These are the people who take this journey with me every single day.
While my career has been about protecting the brilliance of my students, I am learning every day as a mom that I also need to protect the brilliance of my own children — and who they are becoming as I watch them explore their community and the world through their own extraordinary eyes.
This work is even more important and valuable because of them. The mission does not stop at school doors. It lives at home, at the dinner table, in the daily act of seeing your children fully — and fighting for the world they deserve.
The Mission, Visualized
Fellowship for Good:
Reclaim Social Work. Protect Student Brilliance.
The degrees came first — Springfield College, Columbia University School of Social Work, and American International College. The academic foundation was built before the buildings. Then came the work: recovery high schools in Springfield, classrooms in Boston, graduate programs at Simmons and Westfield State, a dual role as director and principal, and finally a consulting practice built from scratch.
The infographic traces the throughline. Graduate study → Liberty Prep → University High School → Counselor & Concierge® → USC DSW. Every stop was intentional. Every stop served the same mission.
The Fellowship for Good is not the final chapter. There is no final chapter. The cycle is unbroken. It continues through every student whose brilliance is protected, every practitioner who carries the work forward, and every person who takes their own journey because someone made it possible. This is what that looks like in motion.
Answer the Call →Family
The work
begins at
home.
As a wife, sister, daughter, and mother of two neurodiverse children, this work carries a different kind of weight — and a different kind of meaning.
A career spent protecting the brilliance of other people's children. And now, every single day, the lesson comes home: brilliance looks different in every child. It always has. Watching two children move through the world as their full, neurodiverse selves — and navigating the systems that were not built for them — is not separate from the work. It is the work.
Seeing the world through their eyes. Exploring a global community alongside them. Learning what it means to protect brilliance not just in policy language or practice frameworks, but in the daily act of motherhood — that is the deepest continuing education there is.
The Fellowship for Good is fueled by all of it. The career. The community. The family. The cycle is unbroken because it runs through every room — the classroom, the boardroom, and the living room.
The Fellowship
Every contribution
supports Sherann's
doctoral journey.
This is a campaign rooted in community — and a direct investment in Sherann's pursuit of her Doctor of Social Work at the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work. Every contribution goes toward tuition, capstone research, and fees across nine semesters. Those who poured into this work made it possible to pour into others — and now the community pours back in, so the work can continue. Every tier is an invitation to keep the cycle moving. A true act of resistance.
✦ Personalized handwritten gift from Sherann
✦ Personalized handwritten gift
✦ Counselor & Concierge® virtual workshop — yours to use or gift*
✦ Personalized handwritten gift
✦ Counselor & Concierge® virtual workshop — yours to use or gift*
✦ Paid Substack access
✦ Personalized handwritten gift
✦ Counselor & Concierge® virtual workshop — yours to use or gift*
✦ Paid Substack access
✦ VIP · Top Shelf Soiree · Summer 2029
* Counselor & Concierge® virtual workshop redeemable for any quarterly offering. Transferable as a gift.
Choose how you give.
Contributions are personal gifts and are not tax-deductible. Fellowship for Good is not a registered nonprofit. All funds go directly to Sherann Alkins toward USC doctoral tuition, capstone research, and fees.
For Advocates & Griots
You invested in the work.
Now help carry the story.
A Griot is the keeper of the community's story — the one who ensures the narrative is never lost, never silenced, never forgotten.
Advocates ($1,000) and Griots ($2,500) receive complimentary paid access to the Substack — where scholarship is published, the fellowship journey is documented in real time, and resources rooted in twenty years of practice are shared. Griots also receive VIP access to the Top Shelf Soiree in Summer 2029.
The Signature Series
The
Pour.
The Pour is a nine-semester signature series of bespoke events created specifically for women entrepreneurs — the mompreneurs, solopreneurs, auntie entrepreneurs, sister-founders, and community makers who are always pouring into everything and everyone else.
This is the invitation to pour into yourself. Two intimate in-person gatherings per semester in Boston, rotating through experiences designed to nourish, restore, celebrate, and build the women who show up. Every ticket brings you into the inner circle of the Fellowship for Good — and every ticket sale brings us closer to the $97,000 goal.
The Pour is not your traditional fundraiser. This is a fellowship fund — an intimate, rotating gathering of women who believe that when one of us rises, all of us soar. We elevate together. We move to a higher timeline — quantum leap, collective ascension, every woman bringing the next one with her. The series culminates in Summer 2029 with the Top Shelf Soiree.
Ticket tiers — every event:
On the Rocks — $50 · Entry into the fellowship community + curated salon experience + cocktail/mocktail + light bites
Neat — $75 · Everything above + reserved seating + branded keepsake to take home
Top Shelf — $100 · Everything above + VIP circle access + name recognition at the event + intimate moment with Sherann
Click Notify Me to join the list. When tickets go live, the button becomes Get Your Ticket. Seats are limited.
The Fellowship Wall
When you come in,
you get to
speak.
Every contributor — at every tier — receives a personal invitation to record their story. Their connection to the work. Their reason for joining. Their voice added to the wall.
This fellowship is not a transaction. It is a testimony. And every voice belongs here.
Come in at any tier.
The Village, The Circle, The Scholar, The Advocate, or The Griot — every level earns a place on the wall.
Check your email.
Within 48 hours a personal link arrives to record your testimony — your words, your story, your reason for showing up.
Your story joins the fellowship.
Once recorded, the testimony is reviewed and added to the scrolling fellowship wall — seen by every person who lands on this page.
The prompt you'll receive:
Share your connection to this work — and tell us why you chose to be part of the Fellowship for Good.
Share It Forward
Scan. Share. Show Up.
This QR code links directly to this page. Print it on slides, at events, on business cards. Every scan is an invitation into the fellowship.
Fellowship for Good · Full Circle Community Campaign