Mackensey Carter

Mackensey Carter (she/her), LCSW, returned to CGLA in 2025 as the Director of Client Experience and Support, where she leads the client intake process and oversees the Client Support Services team. In this role, Mackensey is responsible for developing and sustaining client-centered, trauma-informed systems and practices that ensure CGLA’s legal advocacy is grounded in dignity, care, and responsiveness to client needs.

Mackensey previously worked at CGLA from 2016 to 2020 as a social worker, including several years on a specialized project providing intensive case management to young people on juvenile parole who were represented by CGLA attorneys in parole revocation proceedings. Her work centered on supporting clients navigating complex legal systems while addressing the impacts of structural trauma caused by criminalization. Mackensey also played a key role in revising and implementing CGLA’s Stability Matrix assessment tool and in operationalizing the organization’s interdisciplinary model of practice.

Following her time at CGLA, Mackensey focused on community violence intervention and trauma-focused community mental health. She worked as part of the Healing Hurt People (HHP) team at John H. Stroger Hospital and Comer Children’s Hospital, a community-based violence intervention program providing long-term, therapeutic case management to individuals who have experienced a violent injury related to community violence. In addition to direct clinical work, Mackensey provided clinical supervision to fellow clinicians and MSW student interns and helped develop and facilitate trainings on trauma-informed care and secondary traumatic stress.

Mackensey earned her Master of Social Work from Loyola University Chicago and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Theology from Georgetown University.