As a student pursuing a Bachelor’s in Social Work, I have had the opportunity to work on multiple projects that tie to the professional competencies associated with a BSW in my program. In some cases, my work has given me similar opportunities to develop in my practice.
competency 1
demonstrate ethical and professional behavior
Social workers must be well-versed and trained in the ethics of their position, intervention and interpersonal skills, and know how to communicate effectively whether in conversation or written documentation. These skills may be developed in a variety of arenas, including education, work experience both in and out of the social work field, and volunteerism and service learning opportunities.
My resume shows my professional history, summarizing some of the most important aspects of my work in the community in the last twenty years. Though much of my work was not directly related to social work, I have gained skills, including the ability to connect with people, empathize, and solve problems both for clients and the organizations I worked for. Additionally, it shows my degree track and specific training I have undergone to ensure my capacity to abide by the professional and ethical standards of the field.
As social workers, we are trained to work with a variety of populations. “Everyone is different” may sound obvious, but it is critical to understand that every person, no matter how much they have examined their personal history of beliefs, carries the sum of their eperiences with them and is influenced by them. Social workers have to be prepared to meet people where they are, no matter what their background may be, which is to say, to assume that a person is always doing something for a reason, even if we do not understand or agree with the reason for their actions. It may be informed by cultural heritage, socioeconomic factors, or other individual circumstances.
In my first semester Social Work Practice course, we were asked to watch several episodes of a documentary and select an individual to work with as though they were our client. As one of the populations I am interested in working with in the future are Latin American immigrants, I watched Living Undocumented, and conducted my foundation assessment with one woman in the story. This process allowed me to engage critically with the experience of undocumented immigrants and learn more about the reasons someone might not follow U. S. immigration policy when coming here.
competency 2
engage diversity and difference in practice
competency 3
advance human rights and social, economic, and environmental justice
One of our core responsibilities as social workers is not just to work with a variety of populations, but to work to advance the rights of every group. Human rights, and justice on multiple levels, are part and parcel of social work practice. This has not always been the case, but as our field’s understanding of systems and their impact on an individual’s life has grown, it has become clear that we must push for justice and equity on all levels.
This semester I had the privilege of taking Social Entrepreneurship and Social Change, a course which explores the process of building businesses geared toward a goal of social change, rather than just profit. One of the key motivators for me in seeking a social work degree was to work with the LGBT community, especially the transgender community, for whom access to healthcare is an ongoing issue. My challenge this semester was to design a “social enterprise” that could tackle the problem, and here I have placed my final pitch for the program. It is my hope to use this as a baseline in my career to help advance the human rights of transgender people.
Social workers must clearly understand how to conduct and apply research, both to improve the work we do in the field, and to advance the knowledge we provide to others. We must be able to analyze and evaluate our solutions to a problem to determine their efficacy, both to ensure that we are using validated, effective interventions with our clients, and to assess areas of need so that we can develop new solutions to those problems.
As part of my Research Methods course, I was certified on the CITI Course in the Protection of Human Subjects, a requirement for any social science research. It is our responsibility not only to conduct analysis and evaluation, but to ensure we are doing so in a way that does not harm the participants in a study. We reviewed the legal requirements of social science research, and why those laws were passed, to be sure that we fully understand the need for ethical research.
competency 4
engage in practice-informed research and research-informed practice
competency 5
engage in policy practice
Policy surrounds everything we do, as social workers and as people. No matter whether it is federal law, city ordinance, or a rule put in place by an employer, policies guide the way social workers and our clients interact with one another, and with the systems around them. A social worker’s role often includes making policies, or advocating for policy changes when they are needed. Just as policies exist on multiple levels, policy practice could mean anything from talking to your supervisor about an office rule to participating in writing draft legislation or advocating with members of Congress.
One method of engaging in policy practice is to approach legislators with an advocacy brief like the one pictured, and a prepared “elevator speech” about why this issue is important. Lawmakers are busy people, and sometimes having a clearly communicated summary of an issue presented by a constituent can draw their attention to a bill or initiative they might not have otherwise considered more closely. An advocacy brief is a simple, straightforward way that many social workers and lobbyists communicate the issues that are important to them, and their recommendations to policymakers.
Another core aspect of social work practice is engaging with clients, whether they are individual people, or groups linked by family ties, social connections, or political and geographic regions. We work to make connections with people and foster communication between them, because our relationships with each other are one of the most important things in our day-to-day lives. We also recognize the importance of understanding our personal experiences and how they may limit our ability to engage with others, and in those times work to build relationships with other professionals to help foster that engagement.
During a service learning project, I worked with four other students to update a community resource guide for Rantoul Township High School. We communicated with the administrators at the school, and worked with a copy of the previous version—updated in 2011—to make an updated one. As a bonus, we created a website version so that people could access this information without needing a physical copy. We used our engagement skills to connect with each other, the school, and service providers in Rantoul and throughout Champaign County to complete this project, which we hope saves time for people in need of quick access to information about healthcare, clothing, or shelter in an emergency.
competency 6
engage with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities
competency 7
assess individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities
Assessment is a constant piece of any social work interaction. A social worker has to gather information from their client, analyze it, and work with the client to set goals to overcome their present challenges. At each stage of the process, the social worker must reassess whether the client has made progress, whether there are new challenges or obstacles to overcome, and whether the intervention they have chosen is the correct one for the presenting problem.
In my second Social Work Practice course, we learned about working with families and groups, as well as individuals. Our Family Assessment paper requireed us to do a little creative writing, coming up with a character to use as our main client. Then, based on some example materials, we conducted an assessment of our client’s family and the various factors in play between them. Assessments like this provide social workers with a baseline understanding of the challenges faced by a family, and help us decide where to start our work with them. Assessment would also continue throughout the process as new dynamics might be uncovered in the course of treatment or intervention.
Once an initial assessment is complete, the social worker chooses an evidence-based intervention to work with the client and guide them toward their goal. Often, but not always, these are change-oriented strategies, designed to help a client—be they person, organization, or system—make changes in their life, often by recognizing those changes are possible. In tandem with ongoing assessment, if an intervention strategy is not working, the social worker partners with the client to identify other strategies that may work better.
In my work as an academic coach, the primary reason people seek out coaching is because they struggle in some way with executive functioning. My time in the social work program has emphasized the importance of evidence-based resoures for intervention, like this book, which helps give me a framework to intervene with my clients.
competency 8
intervene with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities
competency 9
evaluate practice with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities
One way that social workers contribute to the body of evidence-based practices is by evaluating the programs and interventions they use. An intervention designed for one group of people in one environment may not work with a different group with different sociodemographic factors at play. An individual may have additional challenges that make following the steps of a process more difficult for them. Similarly, we may find that the combination of influences was right, and the client was able to meet their goal exactly the way they wanted. We only know this through measured evaluation.
The final project of my Research Methods course was to design a research study to evaluate an intervention. I selected the Bounce Back curriculum, designed to improve outcomes for children who have experienced community-based violence. The original program was designed to work in densely-populated urban environments, and the proposal was to determine whether it would be effective in the Champaign-Urbana community. If this proposed study proved fruitful, it might be possible to apply for state or federal funding for rolling out the program throughout our school districts. Only through evaluation can we determine whether this would be worthwhile, or whether we could alter parts of the intervention to better apply to our community.
Daniel K. Sheff 