Teaching Critical Social Policy in Canada: Some Personal Reflections

Abstract

Discusses problems in teaching social policy courses which students often view as not necessary for practice. Documents teaching of critical social policy to Canadian students and identifies a number of problems in making it interesting, such as the abstract nature of the content, general lack of understanding of the importance of policy analysis, and fear of an unknown subject. Highlights key teaching strategies and assessment methods and notes constraints, successes and failures in teaching the subject.

Keywords:

• Critical theory
• social work trajectory
• analogy
• media watch
• neo‐liberalism