Celebrating Nearly 40 Years of husITa: A Farewell and Thank You

The following announcement was shared to the husITa Listserv on October 15, 2026.

Dear husITa community,

After nearly four decades at the intersection of human services and technology, husITa (Human Service Information Technology Applications) will formally dissolve by the end of 2026. This decision was not made lightly, and we share it with deep gratitude and real hope for what comes next.

Since the first international husITa conference in Birmingham, England, in 1987, husITa has been a home for practitioners, researchers, educators, and advocates who believe technology can advance human welfare. Over the years, we gathered at a dozen international conferences, sponsored the Journal of Technology in Human Services (JTHS), celebrated innovators through the Best Human Services App Awards, and shared our members' work through the husITa Podcast. The field husITa helped start has since grown well beyond it, and that may be our proudest legacy. A fuller history will appear in an editorial forthcoming in JTHS.

husITa's most important work continues in good hands:

• JTHS is now sponsored by NTEN, a leading community of nonprofit technology professionals. Our thanks to Amy Sample Ward and the NTEN team, to JTHS Editor Lauri Goldkind, and to our colleagues at Taylor & Francis.

• The husITa Podcast is moving to The Social Work Podcast, thanks to former husITa Treasurer Jonathan Singer, where its episodes will remain open to everyone.

• The husita.org website is preserved on the Internet Archive, and husITa's history is summarized on its Wikipedia page.

husITa's social media accounts have been or will be closed, and there will be no further conferences, board elections, or awards.

In celebration, Jimmy Young hopes to gather those who may be present next week at the Council on Social Work Education’s Annual Program Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia for a networking lunch. Details can be found here.

To everyone who served on the board, organized or presented at a conference, edited, wrote for, or reviewed for JTHS, judged an award, joined the podcast, or simply stayed engaged with this community: thank you. husITa was always about what comes next. Its legacy lives on in the work you continue to do and in the communities you serve.

With gratitude,

Jimmy A. Young, PhD, MSW, MPA, Treasurer
Alexis Speck Glennon, DSW, LCSW-R, Chair