Ann Weaver Nichols
Activist for racial justice alternatives to violence human rights care for children prison reform universal health care and the abolition of the death penalty. Mother of eight; three birth children and five foster children (Catherine Michael and Miles Nichols; Mardi Nassau Johnnary Mexi and Haley Fiallos.) Partner of Andy Nichols. Teacher of over 1700 social workers in her 39-year career on the faculty of ASU School of Social Work. Ann was in the first generation of her family to go on for higher education. She earned a BA from Stanford University where she met Andrew Wilkinson Nichols a medical student. They married on September 6, 1965, and served in the Peace Corps in Peru 1966-68. Her Master's and Doctorate in Social Work are from Columbia University with concentrations in community organizing social welfare policy and planning. She was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in 1964. In 1970 Ann joined the faculty of the Arizona State University School of Social Work and commuted from Tucson to Tempe to teach. She was instrumental in creating the Tucson Component of the School of Social Work in 1978. She co-authored a popular textbook Initiating Change in Organizations and Communities. Active with the YWCA from the time she was a student at Stanford Ann served on the National Board from 1969-82 and the World YWCA Executive Committee from 1975-83. She became a YWCA trainer on human rights and leadership development in the U.S. and Colombia Argentina England Uganda and Singapore. She works on racial justice issues through the Tucson YWCA where she has been President and was honored as a "Woman on the Move" in 2003. Ann was a founding member of the Coalition of Arizonans to Abolish the Death Penalty and the Arizona Coalition for Human Services as well as helping develop and pass the Healthy Arizona Initiative (Prop 204). Other organizations where Ann has served include T.A.C.C. (Child & Family Resources) American Friends Service Committee Children's Action Alliance La Hacienda/Pathways Samaritan Center of Tucson and Alternatives to Violence Project. She has been honored by the National Association of Social Workers' Arizona Chapter as Social Worker of the Year in 1983 and 1994 and received a "Lifetime Achievement Award" in 1999. She also received the Jefferson Award for community service in 1995.