SocW 510 Generalist Micro/Meso Level Practice

Instructors for Spring 2008

• Teresa Jones*

Course Overview:

Generalist Micro/Meso Level Practice is a two-quarter course sequence in which generalist practice knowledge and skills are informed by knowledge pertaining to human behavior and the social environment, multiculturalism, and social justice. This sequence prepares students for entry-level generalist practice with the knowledge and skills needed for effective and accountable social work practice with individuals, families, small groups and service delivery systems to promote maximal functioning and quality of life.

Course Sequence Goals

SW 510 will prepare students for entry level generalist practice with knowledge and skills needed for engagement, relationship building, and interviewing, focusing primarily on services to individuals in the context of family and service systems. SW 511 will prepare students for entry level generalist practice with knowledge and skills needed for assessment, intervention planning and decision-making with individuals, families, and groups within the context of service systems.

Course Objectives (**These items will be primarily emphasized in SW 510.)

Upon completion of this sequence, students will be able to:

1) Adopt a multicultural and empowerment approach to practice by:

1. **Demonstrating awareness of one's own assumptions, beliefs, values, and behaviors with regard to race, class, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, ability, age, and religion and how these might affect the social work relationship.
2. **Understanding the multiple and intersecting identities within oneself and one's clients, and how these affect position and access to resources in the larger society.
3. **Affirming and respecting one's own and others' cultural identities.
4. **Working collaboratively with diverse clientele and agency personnel pursuant to the social justice mission of the profession.
5. **Focusing on strengths in supporting clients in the specification of goals.
6. **Being mindful of the role of power differentials and other social inequalities in influencing human behavior and social relations among diverse populations and within the social work relationship.
7. **Drawing on the perspectives and theories of multiculturalism and social justice when engaged in assessment and intervention.

2) Apply knowledge and skills of generalist practice to social work with individuals, families, groups, and service systems to:

1. **Build interpersonal relationships characterized by warmth, genuineness, empathy, and cultural awareness.
2. **Understand the social work process, i.e., data gathering, assessment, contracting, work, and termination.
3. Understand and be capable of differentially drawing on select social work practice theories when conducting assessments and considering intervention alternatives.
4. **Use interviewing skills that focus on the strengths of individuals, families, communities, and service delivery systems for the purpose of creating solution-focused assessments.
5. Implement specialized assessment skills such as those pertaining to suicide risk, alcohol and other drug problems, child/elder abuse, and domestic violence.
6. Develop skills in intervention planning and decision making with individuals, families and groups.
7. Evaluate intervention approaches in order to examine the extent to which they are or are not culturally appropriate for specific client groups.
8. **Obtain, consume, and appropriately draw from pertinent literature to guide practice, and understand limitations in the applications of published literature with people from non-dominant cultures.
9. Organize information (written and oral) for communication between workers and organizations.
10. Recognize and critically evaluate ethical dilemmas in one's own social work practice by applying the NASW Code of Ethics to interpret and resolve ethical conflicts.
11. Use practice evaluation methods.
12. **Understand the social justice ramifications of working with involuntary clients.

3) Apply knowledge of human development and skillfully analyze linkages between individuals and their environment by:

1. **Evaluating the complex, reciprocal linkages between human behavior and clients' multiple social environments including cultures, families and groups.
2. **Drawing on pertinent knowledge and theory related to biological, sociological, psychological, cultural, economic and political factors and processes needed to understand individual and collective behavior.
3. **Applying a social justice paradigm in understanding social problems and be able to differentiate that approach from alternative approaches to problem definition.
4. **Critically assessing theories of human development and their applicability to clients with varying cultural backgrounds.

Course Objectives (**These items will be primarily emphasized in SW 511.)

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