The Watercooler Phenomenon: Building Relationships in the Online Classroom

ABSTRACT

Students who are admitted into social work graduate programs juggle multiple responsibilities: coursework, field practice, employment, and personal. Such competing responsibilities can increase stress levels. Integrating self-care strategies into daily practice routines may benefit students by improving well-being and decreasing the chances of burnout. Hence, teaching and integrating self-care in the MSW curriculum is imperative for ensuring student success. This article shares results from a qualitative study that explored student perceptions of a self-care assignment integrated into asynchronous online social work field education seminars. It also highlights how this assignment created a space for relationship-building in an online environment.

KEYWORDS:

• self-care
• social work
• teaching
• field education
• asynchronous online

Disclosure statement

Both authors declare no potential conflicts of interest with respect to research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. No financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.