Assignment - Project: Agency Visit
In order to function as change agents, social workers interact with others in a wide variety of organizations. Visiting a social work agency allows students of social work to get a glimpse of the form that these interactions may take.
For this Assignment, visit a nonprofit social service agency in your area and interview a social worker there.
You identify your agency and the social worker you will collaborate with.
During the interview:
1. Focus on the social worker's educational background and training.
2. Determine whether the social worker is licensed, and find out about what brought him or her to the field as well as his or her work history.
3. Inquire about the social worker's job activities, professional roles, and target client group, as well as services provided by his or her organization.
4. Determine the social worker's professional work preferences (e.g., group, individual).
5. Ask about professional development and the social worker's strategies for self-care.
Submit a 5- to 7-page written account of your findings that satisfies the guidelines detailed in the Project: Agency Visit and Paper Rubric.
For this week:
Submit the names of the social service agency and the social worker you plan to interview. This submission will not be graded but you will receive feedback from your Instructor on your chosen agency and social worker.
Assignment: Mezzo Skills
Introduction
Picture this: You are a new intern at a mental health agency that serves children and adults with varied concerns. Your supervisor assigns you the task of co-leading a group. Your first thought is "Hurray, how exciting!" Your next thought is "Wait, I have never run a group before" or "I have never run a group with this population before." How will you prepare in order to assist with the group? What questions might you ask about the group in order to be best prepared to co-lead? Running a group takes much preparation and planning and sometimes the best laid plans fall through (for example, no one shows up). Further, running groups presents different challenges compared to working with individuals. Consider the obvious-there are many more people to work with at one time. How might that challenge also be a benefit? How might your group benefit from the interaction of its members both with you and with each other?
This week, you analyze the benefits and pitfalls of social work practice in groups. You also examine roles of group members in social work practice and how their behaviors can promote appropriate group interactions.
Learning Objectives
Students will:
- Analyze client benefits of group work in a social work case study.
- Analyze potential pitfalls of group member interactions in a social work case study.
- Analyze challenges of group member roles in social work practice.
- Analyze skills for overcoming challenges in group practice.
- Analyze group role behaviors to promote appropriate group interactions.
- Develop skills for working with client systems based on levels of social work practice.