EXPANDED COURSE DESCRIPTION

Social Work Practice and Learning Lab (PL) is the second of a two-semester foundation social work course that introduces all Silberman School of Social Work students to professional social work practice in the contemporary contexts of individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities.  SSW 718 builds on first semester content that exposed students to core beginning social work skills and knowledge, with an emphasis on applying essential concepts and skills across social work methods.  SSW 718 draws upon practice wisdom for social justice infused social work practice. This approach explores the dynamics of privilege and disadvantages embedded in racism, sexism, classism, and other forms of systemic oppression and notes their historical roots, intergenerational legacies, within-group differences, intersectionality, and local as well as global manifestations. The course explores contemporary inequity, social hierarchy, and systemic oppression, and examples of people taking action together for self-education about systems of oppression enabling communities of people to take action.

The liberation health framework is introduced providing a social justice practice model for clinical practice with individuals, families, and groups. The model reaffirms the defining distinction of social work that challenges faced by individuals, families, and communities cannot be understood in isolation from the economic, political, cultural contexts in which they present themselves and from which they developed.

All students are exposed to common aspects of all social work practice and the distinct aspects of methods-based social work. Lab provides a framework for students to understand methods-based social work practice skills, particularly in agency-based settings. Emphasis is placed on students acquiring skills and knowledge to recognize systemic oppression in agency settings and take action to achieve agency goals of client services that are free of stigmatization and systems of dominance.

The following fundamental phases of practice undergird the second-semester Lab, thereby providing students’ opportunities to both understand and practice the fundamentals in the lab environment:

• Relationship-Building & Engagement: Professional authentic use of self, tactical self-awareness, boundary setting, establishment of trust, and assessing dynamics of power, privilege, oppression, and positionality;
• Assessment & Community Engagement: Collaborative teaching/learning with client systems, developing familiarity with the community while attending to meaning, context, power, history, and possibility; and,
• On-going Intervention: Establishing worker-service user/community member agreements for action, setting agreed-upon tasks and activities, assessing both concrete outcomes for the work and supporting marginalized service user systems in resisting dominance as an approach to tapping into their collective power.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

As a result of successful completion of this course students will be able to:

1. Make ethical decisions by applying standards of the National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics and, as applicable, of the International Federation of Social Workers/ International Association of Schools of Social Work Ethics in Social Work, Statement of Principles (EPAS 2.1.2)
2. Tolerate ambiguity in resolving ethical conflicts (EPAS 2.1.2)
3. Apply strategies of ethical reasoning to arrive at principled decisions. (EPAS 2.1.2)
4. Recognize the extent to which a culture’s structures and values may oppress, marginalize, alienate, or create or enhance privilege and power (EPAS 2.1.4)
5. Gain sufficient self awareness to eliminate the influence of personal biases and values in working with diverse groups (EPAS 2.1.4)
6. View themselves as learners and engage those with whom they work as informants (EPAS 2.1.4)
7. Understand the forms and mechanisms of oppression and discrimination. (EPAS 2.1.5)
8. Advocate for human rights and social and economic justice. (EPAS 2.1.5)
9. Initiate actions to achieve organizational goals (EPAS 2.1.10)

CSWE COMPETENCIES AND PRACTICE BEHAVIORS

EPAS Competency	Practice Behavior	Method(s) of Assessment
2.1.2 Apply social work ethical principles to guide professional practice	a. Recognize and manage personal values in a way that allows professional values to guide practice. b. Make ethical decisions by applying standards of the National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics and, as applicable, of the International Federation of Social Workers/International Association of Schools of Social Work Ethics in Social Work, Statement of Principles c. Tolerate ambiguity in resolving ethical conflicts d. Apply strategies of ethical reasoning to arrive at principled decisions	Contribution to Knowledge
2.1.4 Engage diversity and a multiplicity of ways of being in practice	a. Recognize the extent to which a culture’s structures and values may oppress, marginalize, alienate, or create or enhance privilege and power  b. Gain sufficient self-awareness to eliminate the influence of personal biases and values in working with diverse groups d. View themselves as learners and engage those with whom they work as informants	Contribution to Knowledge Final Assignment
2.1.5 Advance human rights and social and economic justice	a. Understand forms and mechanisms of oppression and discrimination b. Advocate for human rights and social and economic justice c. Understand forms and mechanisms of oppression and discrimination	Contribution to Knowledge
2.1.10 Engage, assess, intervene and evaluate with individuals, families, groups, organizations and communities	h.   Initiate actions to achieve organizational goals	Final Assignment