What Changes MSW Students' View on the Mission of Social Work?

Little is known about how professional social work education affects students' view on the social work mission. Using a secondary analysis of larger longitudinal data collected from masters in social work (MSW) students in California, USA, this study sought to explore the relationship among the students' demographic characteristics, their primary reasons for pursuing an MSW degree, and their view on the mission of social work at the time of entering an MSW program, whether the students' view on the mission of social work changed in the course of an MSW education, and factors contributing to a change of MSW students' view on the social work mission—individual adaptation vs societal change—between the beginning and the end of the MSW program. The results showed that students' degree of social action involvement, type of field practicum, and ideological variables predicted students' view changes or adherence between entering the MSW program and graduating.     

‘Not Easily Put Into a Box’: Constructing Professional Identity

Researching the interplay between social work students' personal and professional identities, I found that, in talking about becoming professionals, students drew on a wide range of discourses. Three common usages of the term ‘professional identity’ are explored here: it can be thought of in relation to desired traits; it can also be used in a collective sense to convey the ‘identity of the profession’. Taking a more subjective approach, professional identity can be regarded as a process in which each individual comes to have a sense of themselves as a social worker. I argue that the variations in students' talk reflect a wide range of cultural understandings that are prevalent within the social work community and society in general, and conclude that professional identity is more complicated than adopting certain traits or values, or even demonstrating competence. The different meanings of professional identity all have something to offer, providing resources for students as they construct themselves as social workers. This is important for social work education because it acknowledges the dynamic nature of professional identity, highlights the difficult identity work which each student must undertake, and prompts us to consider how this process might best be supported.     

Exploring Professional Stereotypes and Learning for Inter-professional Practice: An Example from UK Qualifying Level Social Work Education

This paper explores the concept of stereotyping from UK social work students' and educators' perspectives. It discusses findings from an exploration of inter-professional practice with two cohorts of final year social work students in a UK university. The authors adapted a questionnaire to initiate discussion about inter-professional working with BA and MA students participating in a specialist child and family social work module. This paper analyses students' responses to the questionnaire and explores wider issues relating to professional stereotyping and identity, discussing the usefulness of these concepts for social work education and collaborative practice. Results suggest that student social workers held both positive and negative assumptions about specific occupations/professions (such as medicine), and that these acted as a mirror or tool for reflecting back their own views of social work identity/ies. We argue that this pedagogic exercise in identifying stereotypical assumptions about ‘others’ may encourage the building of a positive sense of ‘own’ professional identity. We further suggest that students should be encouraged to construct a core social work identity that is dynamic and responsive to changing contexts.     

The ‘Building Blocks’ of Professional Identity among Social Work Graduates

Based on systems theory, the current study aimed to examine the relationships between the following sets of variables: input variables—satisfaction with supervision, self-differentiation, and sense of coherence; throughput variables—values and empathy; and the output variable—professional identity of BSW students. Questionnaires were completed by 160 social work students who were about to graduate the social work program. Path analysis (The AMOS 5 program) was used to analyze the research model. Satisfaction with supervision was the only input variable that was directly related to professional identity. Of the throughput variables, empathy and personal values were directly related to professional identity, whereas sense of coherence was indirectly related to empathic concern, with social values as a mediator. Practical recommendations are discussed.     

Ethos of the Day—Challenges and Opportunities in Twenty-first Century Social Work Education

Most of the social work education literatures center on epistemological and pedagogical issues underpinning curriculum design and teaching methods. There is less attention paid to the socio-economic and technological context of the society that has a significant impact on both teachers and students. This paper brings forth a discussion on such impact in terms of the political economy and electronic-mediated mode of communication in the twenty-first century. Social work educators find themselves engaged in a consumption cycle involving industry, higher education and students. The students become the ‘updated nomads’ with an instrumental and entitlement mentality. The paper also discusses the specific challenges and opportunities to social work educators in such a scenario. Preparing students to practice in the market-driven welfare field, helping students to build up a professional identity that finds personal meaning and significance, and understanding students' search for continuity between life and professional experiences present social work educators with worthy tasks in a trying scene. They are to accomplish these tasks in a co-creation process with their students in a trustful and responsible partnership.     

Research Training and Professional Social Work Education: Developing Research‐Minded Practice

The movement towards developing practice more firmly grounded on empirical research has, arguably, been one of the most significant international trends in social work during the past decade. However, in the UK the implications of this trend for pedagogical practices and the design of educational programmes have still to be fully explored. This paper reports on the findings of a repeated cross‐sectional survey of MSW students in Queen's University Belfast which focused on their perceptions of the value of research training to professional practice. The study, conducted over a four year period, explored students' awareness of the relationship between research and practice and their readiness to engage with research training. The findings suggested that the majority of students perceived research training as a valuable component of professional development. However, the study also found a level of scepticism among students about its practical utility along with some resistance towards actively embracing a research agenda. The paper evaluates the significance of these findings for developing research and evidence‐based practice as integral components of the new degrees in social work in the UK and for social work education programmes in other countries aiming to develop research‐minded practice.     

Social Work Students' Research-Related Anxiety and Self-Efficacy: Research Instructors' Perceptions and Teaching Innovations

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine social work research instructors' perceptions of research-related anxiety and research confidence among social work students, and teaching strategies to identify and manage anxiety. A national web-based survey of 186 BSW and MSW social work research instructors was conducted. Many BSW (70%) and MSW (61%) research instructors reported that they used specific activities or approaches to assess or impact upon student anxiety. Qualitative analysis results suggested a teaching model for social work research instructors designed to reduce students' research-related anxiety, including by enhancing their research confidence. Strategies that instructors can use include creating a supportive class climate, providing activities that are emotion-, cognitive-, and action-focused as well as the use of strategic timing. These findings can be used to guide social work research instructors' facilitation of students' attainment of research competencies and help further students' research–practice integration.     

Detecting and Deterring Plagiarism in Social Work Students: Implications for Learning for Practice

This paper draws on literature and on a recent workshop run for social work educators to outline important considerations in detecting and deterring plagiarism. Plagiarism, greatly facilitated by the use of the Internet, is increasing among students in higher education and there is evidence to suggest that students on social work courses are no less likely to plagiarise than other students. This paper addresses the importance of detecting plagiarism in students who will go on to work in professional practice but, importantly, highlights the importance of deterring plagiarism in order to maximise students' learning, thus enabling their fitness for practice. Conclusions are drawn for learning, teaching and assessment strategies.     

The Clinical Aspects of Case Management and its Role in Graduate Field Education

In graduate social work education, faculty advisors together with practice instructors can improve social work students' skills to link the practical aspects of ‘work responsibilities’ to the clinical underpinnings of case management. Often students are taught the direct services (case management) with a view solely focused on the practical aspects of care, and this curtails the students' opportunity to learn the clinical interventions that exist in all components of social work: to identify, understand and apply clinical dynamics to presenting problems. The authors discuss their work in addressing case management from a clinical perspective with MSW students and recommendations for its inclusion in graduate social work programs.     

Social Work Students' Changing Perceptions of Social Problems After a Year of Community Intervention

This paper aims to throw light on the emotional and cognitive processes of students within social change-oriented field work as they develop over a year, as described through a projective and phenomenological art medium drawn and discussed at the beginning and at the end of the year. The literature on social work points to a discrepancy between the cognitive structural explanations of social problems that are taught to social work students, and their tendency to prefer focusing on individual rather than on societal levels of intervention. The aim of this examination of the students' processes over the year is to increase our understanding of the students' experience and understanding of their social change mission, so as to better prepare them for the challenges it entails, and to see where they get ‘lost’. Findings from this paper point to the gradual internalization of social change as a complex process, combined with the reframing of this complexity into tangible results.     

Attitudes,Perceptions and Concerns of Student Social Workers: First Two Years of a Longitudinal Study

A longitudinal study was initiated by the authors in September 2001 to monitor the changing attitudes, perceptions, concerns and experiences of 32 social work students during their two‐year MSW training at University College Dublin, subsequently following the students into their first three years of practice. This paper reports on the findings from the first two years of the study, exploring how much the attitudes of the respondents changed towards different areas of social work practice while they were full‐time students. Both quantitative and qualitative data have been collected by means of mixed method questionnaires, taken at four points over a two‐year period, and a focus group. Issues examined included the students' changing perceptions of stress, job satisfaction and levels of expertise in different areas of social work practice. The study also monitored their willingness to work in specific areas of social work after graduation. Statistical analysis revealed that students consistently rated social work in the areas of child protection and welfare as requiring high levels of expertise, but they associated the area with higher levels of perceived stress and lower levels of job satisfaction. These attitudes remain relatively stable throughout their two‐year professional training. However, the study revealed greater changes in the students' willingness to work in different areas. For example, specialist family services such as fostering and child/adolescent became more popular choices for future work settings. This change was noted to have occurred between the start and end of the course. Also noteworthy was that general medical, probation and welfare showed the most negative change.     

Becoming a Social Worker: Chris' Account

Chris Murray, a young African-American male, admitted on a scholarship to a social work masters program, reflexively explores his negotiation of difference in dialogue with an Australian female social work educator twice his age. Standpoint theory and the concept of intersectionality are used to frame Chris' experiences at a private northeast US university after achieving an undergraduate degree in his southern home state. His initial access to university came through military service. Chris was interviewed by the author as part of her international study project examining social work students' experience of diversity in the classroom. The open-ended interview was designed to allow self-identity of difference. Chris ethnographically recounts to a stranger a subjectivity statement of who he is in relation to studying social work. Chris' story works the hyphen between the binary of subjectivity and objectivity through the particulars of his personal history and world-view and his expectation that I as a social work educator share his seeking of social justice. His detailing of what moved him to become a social worker and contextual complexities negotiated along the way connect to wider discourses on how agency and structure play out in lived experience in seeking social justice.     

Student Participation in Study Abroad Programs: Social Justice Implications for Tertiary Education

ABSTRACT

Short-term study abroad programs are increasingly embraced by Australian schools of social work. These programs improve access to international experiences and have a demonstrable impact on academic outcomes. However, little is known about the factors that influence students who decide to participate in such programs. Using a qualitative semistructured design, eight Australian social work students were interviewed about their perspectives on the pre-application phase of a short-term study abroad program to Ireland that was advertised in early 2018. The findings reveal a number of multilevel structural, institutional, and personal enablers and barriers that impacted their decision to participate. Implications for future research, the tertiary education sector, and social work educators are identified, especially in terms of broader economic and political issues that contradict social justice and render the future of these programs precarious.

IMPLICATIONS

• Short-term study abroad programs offer important learning opportunities for students, but there is a need to understand the dimensions that can impact the decisions of students to participate in these programs.

• The qualitative findings indicate that various factors impact on the participation of students, especially financial and caring responsibilities.

• Further research that is underpinned by a social justice lens is needed to address inequities in student participation.

     

Developing a Cross Border,Multidisciplinary Educational Collaboration

This paper presents a case study of the initiation of a collaborative, multidisciplinary educational program between a US university and a university in Mexico. The authors utilized a developmental model for international engagement. Building upon the work of an interdisciplinary area studies program within the US university, the authors initiated a summer program for students and faculty that included language and cultural immersion, interaction with social agencies in the community and collaborative research. Faculty from the US university provided instruction at the Mexican university, and Mexican faculty provided instruction in both language and content areas to students and faculty from the US university. This program has paid particular attention to the development of mutual cultural and linguistic understanding, utilizing an innovative combination of course work, family and community living opportunities, interdisciplinary learning, and structured educational trips into the community. As the two universities gain experience with each other and begin to resolve logistic and other challenges, student internships, joint semester abroad programs, and use of the program for continuing education for community professionals will be explored.     

Enhancing Student Awareness of the Importance of Full and Accurate Documentation in Social Work Practice

The paper describes a classroom assignment that was used to raise social work students' awareness of the importance of timely, clear, and thorough documentation. The assignment was devised in view of the great importance of quality documentation in social work, coupled with the reluctance of social workers to invest the necessary time and effort to produce it. The core of the assignment was for the students to examine and report on the documentation in two client files at their fieldwork agency. The findings obtained from the students' reports show that about a fifth of the 190 files that were examined did not contain various pieces of basic information about the clients and intervention outcomes, and that much of the information that was provided was unclear and unorganized. The students' written reflections following the completion of the assignment indicate that the assignment achieved its aim of elevating their awareness of the importance of quality documentation. The paper ends with a discussion of issues to consider in repeating the assignment in the future, based on the reflections of the students and their classroom instructors.     

The Use of the Arts and the Strengths Perspective: The Example of a Course Assignment

This article reports the findings of a study that explored factors affecting the choice to graduate from social work made by active students in one of the three social work departments in Greece. Research focused mainly on structural factors (students' socio-economic background and demographic characteristics, the educational system and the system of admission to higher education). It also touched briefly upon students' prevailing work values. Findings indicate that students' socio-economic background and the educational system's structure play a significant role in their choice to graduate from social work. These structural factors seem to have caused their educational/ occupational choice to be a rather limited one, since approximately 30% of the students decided to graduate as a form of compromise. Students rated intrinsic work values highly, which is consistent with prior research findings.     

The Ethical Practitioner in Formation: Issues of Courage,Competence and Commitment

This article reports on a small study exploring students' accounts of ethically difficult situations. Participating students were studying professional qualifying programmes in social education and social work at three higher education institutions in Finland, France and the UK. Variations in how students describe ethically difficult situations are noted—including whether they feature the student as an active moral agent facing a difficult ethical decision and the extent to which they utilise recognisably ‘ethical’ language and concepts. The types of situations reported as ethically difficult are identified as focusing on: the difficulties of challenging service users and colleagues; the power and responsibility of the worker; and defining the boundaries of the professional relationship. Similar types of situations were raised by students in the different countries, although there is some variation in how they describe their ethical difficulties and the specific concerns they raise. Implications for teaching include the need to develop skills and qualities in students that enable them to recognise the ethical dimensions of difficult situations and to develop the courage to act on their decisions.     

Teaching Globalization to Social Work Students: In and Out of the Classroom

This paper was part of qualitative research that sought to explore motivations of Masters-level students (n = 53) in taking an elective course in international social work at a large public university in the Southeastern US. A review of the literature includes the foundational aspects of globalization and its relationship with social work education. Through content analysis, results show comportment of students' stated motivations for taking the course and the contemporaneous literature on globalization. Themes expressed are the historical context of globalization, concern about global inequalities, and the varying impacts of globalization around the world. Discussion is directed towards exploring ways of effectively infusing globalization content in the social work curricula.     

Dressing the Part? The Significance of Dress in Social Work

This paper explores practice educators' views about the significance of dress for social work in the context of UK social work education. The findings, drawn from three focus group discussions, suggest that practice educators regard dress as an important way in which social workers demonstrate values in action. Dress is also seen to play a part in the development and maintenance of a professional social work identity, and is relevant to the physical and bodily experiences of ‘doing’ social work. Social workers should be aware of the significance of dress and self-presentation, and where student social workers fail to demonstrate such awareness, practice educators may have questions about their understanding of the complexity of practice. The paper notes that while participants expressed similar views about the meaning and impact of dress, these are based on the observation and experience of practice, and there is little research evidence specifically concerning dress in social work. The study contributes to an understanding of why practice educators consider that dress may be relevant in the assessment of a student's practice readiness, and suggests areas for further research about this everyday yet significant aspect of a social worker's working life.