NCPG Award Spotlight: Dr. Shandra Parks Champions Multicultural Wellness

This profile is part of a special series recognizing the 2025 NCPG National Awards recipients. Throughout the year, NCPG will highlight the individuals and organizations whose leadership, innovation, and dedication are advancing the prevention and treatment of problem gambling. Together, these stories reflect the strength, diversity, and impact of the professionals working to reduce gambling-related harm and strengthen communities nationwide. 

Over the past two decades, Dr. Shandra Parks. PhD, LMSW, CFSW, CCGSO, has built a career grounded in service to the community, beginning with child welfare and ministry wellness and, more recently, concentrating on problem gambling awareness. As a social worker and President of the Maryland Council on Problem Gambling (MCPG), Dr. Parks has focused her work on communities facing experiencing health disparities, financial hardship, and the long-term impacts of trauma, ensuring that problem gambling awareness is delivered with cultural humility and relevance.

In 2025, Dr. Parks received the Denise Phillips Community Outreach and Multicultural Wellness Award from the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG). This award recognizes her sustained commitment to advancing awareness of problem gambling in multicultural communities. The award is presented annually to a leader who demonstrates extraordinary dedication to multicultural engagement and community outreach.  

Dr. Shandra Parks’ Path to the Problem Gambling Field 

Dr. Parks’ introduction to the problem gambling field began when she attended a training at the Maryland Center of Excellence on Problem Gambling. There, she was introduced to the idea of looking at problem gambling treatment and recovery through a faith-based perspective. This experience helped her see how spirituality, community, and culture connect with gambling-related harm, and made her consider how faith leaders and community spaces can be trusted places for education, support, and recovery.

Through conversations with faith leaders and community members, she came to see how gambling was often normalized, but problem gambling was rarely discussed openly. Rather than isolate problem gambling as a standalone issue, Shandra began integrating it into holistic wellness conversations. She found that while individuals may hesitate to “walk through a therapist’s door,” they are willing to talk about money, safety, and well-being at kitchen tables, in faith communities, and in everyday spaces. By reframing gambling awareness through financial wellness, cultural appropriateness, and community dialogue, she created an entry point that reduces stigma and expands access to resources, an approach that continues to this day. 

Centering Community and Culture in Action Field

Today, Dr. Shandra Parks serves as Board President of the Maryland Council on Problem Gambling, where she leads with a focus on representation, collaboration, and culturally responsive community engagement. In this role, she works to expand outreach to ensure problem gambling awareness reaches communities that have historically been underrepresented in problem gambling prevention and treatment spaces. One program she is particularly passionate about is providing faith-based and culturally competent gambling education, equipping clergy, lay ministers, and community leaders with tools to address safer gambling within their communities.  

Leveraging NCPG’s Agility Grant program, Dr. Parks led the development of a culturally specific prevention initiative designed for the Deaf and hard-of-hearing community. The project adapted existing problem gambling prevention and education materials and infused them with the values, beliefs, worldviews, language norms, and experiences unique to Deaf culture. Rather than simply translating existing content, the initiative centered on cultural nuance, recognizing that effective prevention must reflect how a community communicates, builds trust, and understands wellness. 

Each PSA incorporates American Sign Language, voiceover, and closed captioning to ensure accessibility while preserving cultural authenticity. Developed in collaboration with trusted Baltimore-based community partners, including local churches, the campaign has since been shared with NCPG Affiliates and prevention organizations nationwide. By integrating prevention science with cultural context, the initiative has set a strong example of how gambling education can be both evidence-informed and community-defined. 

“This was a learning opportunity to create culturally relevant content and build trust within marginalized communities that are often overlooked.”

— Dr. Shandra Parks on receiving Agility Grant funding

Career Guidance for New Problem Gambling Professionals: Mentorship, Certification, and Community Engagement 

Along with creating culturally responsive programs, Dr. Parks is dedicated to supporting the next generation of professionals in this field. She encourages new professionals to build strong relationships, find mentors, and get specialized certification, especially if they want to help marginalized and underserved communities. Dr. Parks believes that effective work starts with understanding the needs of the people you serve. 

“My advice for the next generation is to look at the needs of the population you serve, integrate gambling into your work, and train the next generation to continue the conversation.”

— Dr. Shandra Parks on supporting the next generation of clinicians  

She also encourages new professionals to stay connected to the field by attending conferences, joining organizations like NCPG, volunteering in their communities, and getting involved in policy and advocacy work. She believes that lasting progress comes not just from individual skills, but from working together to keep gambling awareness as part of bigger public health and community wellness efforts. 

The Future of Problem Gambling Treatment 

Dr. Parks is now working toward her International Certified Gambling Counselor (ICGC-I) credential, which will further strengthen her clinical background as she continues to lead conversations about problem gambling prevention. She is encouraged by the growing enthusiasm in the field and by new professionals ready to tackle tough challenges with creative ideas and new technologies. As she says, “People are excited to be in this space. It’s exciting to see the next generation stepping up to embrace these challenges with creativity and technology.” For Dr. Parks, this energy shows real progress and hope for the future. 

Looking to the future, she hopes to see a more complete range of care for people affected by gambling addiction, similar to the treatment options available for alcohol and substance use disorders. She supports expanding access to intensive and residential programs that also focus on mental, spiritual, financial, and relationship health. Her vision includes treatment centers where people can take time to reflect and create personal care plans before returning to their communities with ongoing support. At the heart of her view is the belief that gambling treatment should be thorough, flexible, and focused on the whole person.

As Dr. Parks puts it,

“Healing from gambling harm means treating the whole person, not just the problem.”