Laura Chick MSW ’87
The first woman elected to citywide office in Los Angeles, Laura Chick MSW ’87 was re-elected to a second term as city controller in March 2005 with 82 percent of the vote. Since taking office as the city’s chief auditor and accountant, Chick has established herself as the taxpayers’ watchdog, safeguarding the city’s finances while aggressively seeking savings and improvements in public services.

“An MSW is a great background and training for so many careers,” she says. “It taught me problem-solving skills, perspectives and approaches. The social work degree takes you from policy to practice. The training and my life experience combined have been the key to becoming an effective change agent,” adds Chick, who entered the MSW program at age 40.

“I didn’t approach elective office to be something — I entered politics to do something, to roll up my sleeves and help solve problems,” she says, adding that several of the programs and ordinances she’s put in place came directly out of her experience in the USC MSW program. “The field experiences are outstanding. The school works hard to make sure students have the right supervisors and the right placements. And every professor I had was outstanding.”

Of her decision to enroll, she says USC offered a cutting-edge approach to the role social work plays in society — a leadership position the school continues today. “Dean Marilyn Flynn has put the school on the map in a whole different way.”