Thursday, October 1, 2026
Lynbrook resident Carl Mazza is one of only four social workers who was set to receive the highest award from the National Association of Social Workers’ New York City chapter at its annual Leadership Awards Dinner on March 28, after the Herald went to press.
According to Shari Jones, the events and projects coordinator for the organization, the Diamond Leader award is given out to individuals who have strengthened the social work field. They must be nominated for the award, she said, and are selected based on a number of criteria.
Jones said that Mazza was selected namely for helping found Lehman College’s Master’s of Social Work program in 2007.
At the time, Mazza said, hiring managers at social work agencies in the south Bronx, where Lehman College is located, contacted the school and said that they were having trouble filling social work positions. So, he and four other social work professors decided to start a master’s program to encourage students to work in these underserved communities. “We found a niche that was not being served,” he said.
Mazza was also a founding editor of the professional social work journal, Urban Social Work. Additionally, he was a past president of the New York State Social Work Education Association and was the former chairperson of the Criminal and Juvenile Justice Track for the Council on Social Work Education.
He was previously awarded outstanding service to Lehman College; the outstanding peer reviewer for the Journal of Social Work Education; and a lifetime achievement award from Hudson Link, a nonprofit organization providing college education to prisoners. Mazza was also named Person of the Year by the College Initiative Program, which helps people transition from prison to college life.
Mazza is currently writing a book on his work with exonerated and wrongfully convicted people and is writing an article on George Stinner, Jr., the youngest person ever executed in the United States.
Mazza called earning the Diamond Leader award “a great honor,” adding, “It’s really humbling to know that your colleagues see you as a leader.”
