Bringing Social Action Back into the Social Work Curriculum

Abstract

The typical undergraduate social work curriculum addresses social theory yet offers few opportunities to gain practical experience in community organizing, policy advocacy, and social problem-solving - the cornerstones of a social worker's professional identity. To redress this gap, The Catholic University of America has developed a course of supervised field experience for seniors majoring in social work. The course, which melds theory with a class project conceived, designed, and carried out by the students, reflects many commonly accepted principles for social action -determination of goals by the class as a whole respect for each student's abilities, resources, and limitations; effectiveness through self-evaluation and attention to group dynamics; step-by-step successes; a gradual increase in responsibility level; implementation of appropriate assessment and intervention procedures; and embedding of evaluation into project design. Thus, each project exemplifies the community action approach in the real world. Evaluations underscore the benefits for students, who describe feeling empowered, more self-confident, and newly aware of how their efforts enhance society.

Key Words:

• Social action
• under-graduate curriculum
• “hands-on” learning
• community organizing
• policy advocacy
• social problem solving
• neighborhood assessment
• and intervention