Maribel Diaz

Maribel Diaz is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Lecturer in the School of Social Work at California State University, Long Beach. With more than two decades of experience in schools, community mental health, and county agencies, she is deeply committed to advancing equity and resilience for children, youth, and families.

School social work is both Maribel’s specialty and her passion, with over 17 years of direct school social work experience. She has worked closely with parents for more than 20 years, building on her strong understanding of child and adolescent development and attachment theory. These skills - combined with her commitment to parent engagement - continue to shape her practice, teaching, and supervision.

Maribel helped develop, establish, and supervise the Wellness Centers and Intern Institute across the Compton Unified School District, where she trained and mentored MSW interns and provided trauma-informed support to students in foster care or transitional housing. Since 2008, she has built a library of forms, protocols, and procedures that shaped her school social work practice. These tools not only helped her establish Wellness Centers and the Intern Institute at Compton Unified, but also became essential to the Strengthening Youth Resiliency (SYR) initiative, a CSULB-LBUSD partnership designed to reduce anxiety and depression in K–12 schools. As part of SYR, she supervised nine interns each year during the program’s first three years of implementation, helping deliver school-based interventions and ensuring the initiative launched with strong systems already in place. She has also taught SW665: School Social Work to graduate students pursuing their Pupil Personnel Services Credential.

Earlier in her career, Maribel worked with the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health (DMH), where she was co-located in a DCFS office. In that role, she collaborated closely with child welfare staff, supported foster youth in group and family placements, and strengthened her expertise in child welfare and cross-system collaboration.

In addition to her academic and school-based roles, Maribel is the founder of Wholesome Wellness Center, a virtual platform where she provides therapy, clinical supervision, and online education to more than 16,000 students worldwide. She is fluent in Spanish and dedicated to preparing the next generation of social workers while continuing to support communities through education, collaboration, and clinical practice.

Maribel earned her Master of Social Welfare (MSW) from the University of California, Los Angeles (2008) and a B.A. in Child Development with a minor in Psychology from California State University, Northridge (2003).