Teaching Note—Using Group Role-Play Exercises to Build Advocacy Skills and Achieve Equal Opportunity and Justice for All

ABSTRACT

Competent social work practice includes the use of advocacy to promote equal opportunity and justice for all individuals, particularly those living in vulnerable circumstances. Group role-play exercises are an innovative teaching method that can promote advocacy skills guided by social work values and the code of ethics. Group role-play exercises can be modified to fit various contexts, including the debate over health care policy reform. This teaching note will describe how group role-play exercises can be structured to deliver classroom content. In addition, this teaching note will describe how social work educators can use group role-play exercises to teach the process of political advocacy as it relates to promoting equal opportunity and justice for all. To demonstrate this process, the American Health Care Act of 2017 will be utilized as a case example.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Robert G. Hasson

Robert G. Hasson III, PhD, LICSW, is an assistant professor at Providence College.

Christina M. Sellers

Christina M. Sellers, PhD, LCSW, is an assistant professor at Simmons University.