Engaging Students in Aging Policy: My Experience
By Becky Paskind

Infusing the gerontology competencies into the curriculum can feel like a challenge, and is one that each social work program needs to tailor to their curriculum. However our experiences at Metro State College of Denver may help other programs in their planning. Within two weeks of learning that our program had been selected as a GeroRich project, we held a day long retreat to get moving on curriculum infusion. As with any project, communication within our program was essential to our successful infusion efforts.

Plied with good food, coffee and dessert, we spent the retreat looking at each of our foundation syllabi learning objectives and identified competencies associated with them. We tentatively identified some student products that could also measure the outcomes of these competencies. By the end of the day, we knew which courses were in good shape and which ones were not and had established priorities for infusion; we started with the foundation courses needing the most work but where we would gain the most results.

As a result of this planning, we identified that the policy class had the basics needed for infusion. As the lead policy faculty, I was responsible for creating a master syllabus from which all sections of our foundation policy course would be taught (instructors could add content but not remove it from the master syllabus). Although aging was a part of the course goals and objectives and we could identify competencies which related to the course, there was no aging specific content or student products that would provide the learning necessary for infusion to take place.

In order to address the major competency areas in our BSW foundation course, a policy colleague and I opted to write a three part case study exercise on which students would spend two course periods, as well as completing a reading on intergenerational inequities in advance. The roles in the case study are an older adult, her daughter and a social worker. One of the primary goals of this exercise was to help students see there are policy issues that impact their daily practice. On the first day the role groups talk about policy issues impacting their roles, based on their assigned reading and semester-long learning. On the second day they ‘play’ their parts defending their positions and advocating for themselves as the ‘social worker’ tries to figure it all out. The case study intentionally leaves out certain information, just as there would be gaps in information in an initial interview, and the roles also reflect emotions similar to those experienced by families in the field.

I would encourage you to use this case study—students always have fun with this exercise, but in watching them do this over the last few years, it is a little scary for them too.

Case Study: How Policy Impacts Practice, Metro State College of Denver

Becky Paskind is an Assistant Professor at Metro State College of Denver. She served as a GeroRich Faculty Liaison and is currently a CDI Mentor for the CSWE Gero-Ed Center.