From the Editor—Emerging Issues and Possibilities in Social Work Education

Happy New Year! As I reflect on the past year, there many possibilities that have emerged ripe for discourse, scholarship, and research on social work education in 2023. As editor of the Journal of Social Work Education (JSWE), I am hopeful that the discourse and changes from 2022 will lead to thoughtful 2023 submissions proposing new social work education innovations, approaches, and perspectives that increase our responsivity to a quickly changing world. In this editorial, I highlight some of these emerging areas of discussion, challenge, and inquiry for social work education.

1. Social Work Licensure: In August 2022, the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB, 2022) finally released data highlighting long-suspected and disturbing racial disparities in licensing exam pass rates. Discourse since this time has led social work leaders to question the validity of the test’s measurement of social work competency, propose other alternative methods for assessing competency, discuss whether an initial licensing exam required in some states immediately after graduation is necessary, propose abolishing licensing altogether, and immediately addressing the financial effect on social workers of color associated with retaking the exam and delaying the higher salary associated with licensure. Many ideas are currently being discussed within the field, social work leadership, and with ASWB. In the meantime, it is urgent for schools of social work to rapidly address this inequity and support current social work students. Well-informed manuscripts proposing ideas, lessons learned, and strong conceptual and empirical arguments would greatly enhance the field.

2. Engaging in Antiracism, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Practice—Revised Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS) 2022 Competency 3: One of the many new changes in the 2022 EPAS focuses on the ways in which schools of social work educate students to engage in antiracism, diversity, equity, and inclusion (ADEI) and reflect this commitment within their own school, college or department. New changes now require programs to “describe how they engage in specific and continuous efforts within both the explicit and implicit curricula related to ADEI, based on Educational Policy 2.0 ADEI” (Council on Social Work Education [CSWE], 2022, n.p.). Strong conceptual and empirical papers, as well as notes, to guide social work education are encouraged to inform these changes among schools/colleges/departments of social work.

3. Paid Field/Practicum Placements: I use both terms field and practicum here, as there has been some discussion about replacing the word “field” with “practicum” (Heyward, 2023). How do we feel as a profession about the use of field or practicum and why? The 2022 EPAS also asks programs about their explicit policy permitting employment-based field placements. What are the trends and perspectives regarding paid field placements? If viable and advisable, how can we explore making social work education more accessible by encouraging or helping to facilitate paid field placements? Manuscripts introducing new ideas, arguments, or empirical data are welcome for informing this discourse in social work education.

4. “Going Grander” on the Grand Challenges: At the 2023 Society for Social Work and Research Conference, the “Grand Challenges for Social Workgroup: Going Grander!” discussed ways to “go grander” on the Grand Challenges, encouraging more collaboration and participation across the social work profession within existing grand challenges and across the major social work organizations. Specifically, there was discussion regarding the need to further extend the Grand Challenges into social work education and training. We welcome thoughtful, innovative, and specific ideas for increasing the effect of social work education by bringing knowledge developed from the Grand Challenges into the classroom.

5. Technology and Social Work Education: Technology is rapidly growing, changing, and affecting much of what we do in social work practice, research, and in the classroom. The COVID-19 pandemic only accelerated these trends. Telehealth in social work, online social work education, remote meetings, and various other innovations have changed the way we work, teach, and train social work students. We are also living in a time where social media amplifies social polarization and willingly hosts and spreads misinformation. Our students and our clients are more technology savvy than ever. In fact, now trending on Twitter are concerns over the use of Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT among university students, by researchers in research contexts, and more broadly in higher education for teaching (Huange, 2023). Be on the lookout for an invited editorial or manuscript in the coming year focused on these many emerging technology issues from leading experts in the field. Please also consider submitting your own conceptual papers, empirical papers, and demonstration notes that prepare social work educators to knowledgeably and ethically use technology and teach students to do the same.

6. Self-Care: Self-care has been identified as part of ethical practice in both the National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics (2021) and the 2022 EPAS Statement. Do we have a consistent, specific definition of self-care across our profession? What does it look like to effectively teach self-care to social work students so that they can be ethical social workers? What works?

7. Abolitionist Social Work: How is abolition defined within social work? What does this approach or viewpoint mean for teaching social work students how to work with, within, or around existing systems, such as child welfare and criminal justice? What does this perspective mean for Title IV-E funding that provides resources to hire practice faculty, offer stipends to underrepresented students, and child welfare research funding for schools of social work? How does the teaching and preparation of students look from this perspective, and how does it fit with current approaches and the CSWE EPAS? Can students be given the knowledge and skills to practice from this perspective and then find applicable employment in existing positions and organizational and system structures? If not, what kinds of positions would they take? I encourage the submission of well-reasoned manuscripts that answer these and other emerging questions, as well as anticipate and address current criticisms of this perspective.

This is just a brief list, and I am sure I have left something important out. However, please know JSWE is particularly interested in innovative, impactful, and transferable ideas that will improve social work education. If there are other emerging and important social work education issues that you would like to discuss, I am always interested in hearing them.

On another note, we have received many, many submissions focused on COVID-19 and social work education, as well as Health Resources and Services Administration–funded integrated behavioral health program outcomes. Unless these submissions are innovative, have very strong empirical findings or conceptual arguments, or move social work education knowledge vertically, these will be much more difficult to publish. If you have questions about a related submission, please feel free to reach out.

In this issue

This first issue of the new year starts with a manuscript by Latimer offering a warning about predatory conferences in “Predatory Conferences: What Social Workers Need to Know.” This paper offers guidance to avoid being misled by flattering email invitations to present at conferences of questionable quality. Next is a scoping review of virtual simulations by Baker and Jenney, titled “Virtual Simulations to Train Social Workers for Competency-Based Learning: A Scoping Review.” They discuss the effectiveness and potential for simulation to bridge existing gaps in social work education. Next, Oxhandler, Polson, and Moffatt present findings from a national survey of social work faculty concerning the teaching of religion and spirituality to social work students and validate a new social work education scale in “The Religious/Spiritually Integrated Practice Assessment Scale for Educators: A National Survey of Social Work Faculty.” The next article, by Jacobs and Booth, describes the outcomes of a technology-enhanced social work course in “Teaching to Tech: A Quasi-Experimental Assessment of a Technology-Enhanced Social Work Course.” In “Professional Values, Gatekeeping, and Motivations for Seeking the MSW Degree,” Osteen, Morris, Castillo, and Baffour report on a structural equation model analysis of a national sample of U.S. Master of Social Work (MSW) students to assess social work students’ values and decisions to pursue social work, with gatekeeping as a mediator. Milner and Wolfer discuss the application of King and Kitcher’s Reflective Judgment Model as a model for assessing students’ current approaches to resolving real-world problems and engaging in effective decision making in “Using the Reflective Judgment Model to Understand and Appraise Effective Reasoning by Social Work Students.” In “Social Work Students and COVID-19: Impact Across Life Domains,” Cummings, Dunkle, Koller, Lewis, and Mooney report on a cross-sectional survey at two universities, identifying multiple stressors and providing recommendations for social work education.

In “Where Is the ‘T’? Centering Trans Experiences in Social Work Curricula Addressing LGBTQ+ Issues,” Kia, MacKinnon, and Coulombe discuss the need to increase attention to the centering of transgender (trans) people in social work education and offer recommendations for addressing this need. Next, Sherwood and Kattari describe the potential for the application of the social model of disability and the Universal Design for Learning to reduce ableism in social work and other higher education courses in “Reducing Ableism in Social Work Education Through Universal Design for Learning and Policy.” In “An Exploratory Integrative Review of Restorative Justice and Social Work: Untapped Potential for Pursuing Social Justice,” Molloy, Keyes, Wahlert, and Riquino review the literature on restorative justice in social work and the potential for this approach in new social work settings and curricula.

In “Effects of Individual Characteristics and Experiences on MSW Students’ Advocacy,” Park reports on the results of an online survey of MSW students and recent graduates at five schools in the United States to identify individual factors associated with antiracism advocacy and political–social advocacy. Park offers suggestions for social work education based on these findings. Next, Sobeck, Boraggina-Ballard, Najor-Durack, Lashore, and Olivera discuss and report on a case study of high-impact practices to prepare social work students for a career in child welfare in “High Impact Practices in Graduate Education: Preparing Social Work Students for Careers in Child Welfare.” In “Integrating Smart Decarceration Content Across Social Work Curricula,” Young, Trawver, Harris, and Jacob, consistent with the Grand Challenge to Promote Smart Decarceration, offer strategies to integrate content on this topic throughout the social work curricula. In “MSW Students’ Perception of the Professional Identity of the Social Work Practitioner and the Social Work Researcher: Considerations for Educators,” Karki, Moasun, Freymond, Giwa, and Zoltek report on an analysis of images and descriptions social work students provided describing social work practitioners and researchers. Findings revealed two different distinct identities, and the authors discuss implications for teaching social work research. Scott and Aronson discuss social worker–lawyer collaboration as an effective partnership for supporting immigrants at the U.S. border in “Building Professsional Bridges for Those Crossing Borders: Interprofessional Social Worker–Lawyer Training for Supporting Immigrant Clients.” The authors also describe the curriculum for an interprofessional training for this purpose and present posttraining survey results.

Next, Keyes, Hendrix, Tecle, Andino, Bitters, Carter, Koelling, Ortiz, Sanchez, Ota, and Gringeri report on a qualitative analysis of 93 interviews with social work students concerning their experiences in diversity classes in “‘We wonder if white peers even want to understand’: Social Work Students’ Experiences of the Culture of Human Interchange.” Key themes are reported and discussed. In “Teaching Social Justice Through Critical Reflection: Using Immersive Theatre to Address HIV Among Black Gay Men,” Estreet, Johnson, and Archibald report the results of a qualitative study assessing the use of immersive theater as an approach to critical reflection. They discuss the potential promise of this approach when teaching various issues related to social justice and health disparities. The last full article is “Black Social Workers Matter: Using Parallel Narratives to Discuss Social Work History” by Parker. This article presents parallel narratives as a pedagogical strategy to increase awareness and reflection centered on the work of Black social work pioneers.

This issue rounds out with four teaching notes. The first, “Teaching Note—#BlackGirlsMatter and the Social Work Curriculum: Integrating Intersectionality Within Social Work Education” by Opara and Brown, presents intersectionality as a framework for teaching social work students to work effectively with Black girls, with illustrative case studies, student reflections, educational videos, and guest speakers. Next, DeCarlo discusses the benefits of open textbooks and practical advice for pursuing open textbook projects in social work education in “Teaching Note—Adopting, Adapting, and Creating Open Textbooks: A Brief Guide for Faculty.” Noyori-Corbett and Moxley discuss the use of the U.S. Department of State Diplomacy Lab as a tool for research instruction that advances practice with refugees in “Teaching Note—The United States Department of State Diplomacy Lab for Supporting MSW Students’ Engagement in Community-Based Refugee Resettlement Research.” Finally, Branson describes the development and implementation of two speed-dating events for older adults by social work students enrolled in a human behavior in the social environment course in “Teaching Note—Speed Dating With Older Adults: Reducing Ageism in Social Work Students.”