Social work is emerging as a rapidly developing profession in mainland China, a unique context that affects how these new social workers view themselves, their professional identity, and their work. Few studies explore the lived experiences of these new social workers as they enter agencies and begin working with clients while interacting with…

The study reported in this article concerns the beginnings of higher education for women in the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) enclave in Israel. Haredi Jews are a self-secluded fundamentalist group committed to particularly strict interpretation of Jewish religious law. In recent years, they have been compelled by poverty and other factors to allow…

This article compares 49 colleges and universities in mainland China on the level of social work education, department and school affiliation, and duration of the program. Findings indicate great diversity in all 3 categories. Bachelor's degrees of social work are offered in 83.3% of the programs, and 38.8% of the programs offer master's…

In this article, we report the findings from a study exploring the effects of a problem-based learning (PBL) approach to teaching and learning on learning outcomes for master's of social work (MSW) students. Students who participated in a PBL pilot project were compared with students who did not participate in 5 outcome areas: social work…

There is a dearth of research on social work students' attitudes toward lesbians and gays in East Asian countries where intolerance toward nonheterosexuality has been documented. This article presents findings from the first study in Hong Kong using a Chinese version of Herek's Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men Scale (ATLG) to…

It is important to develop commitment to community practice among social work students to encourage their engagement in this field as professionals later in life. This research examines factors that affect commitment to community practice among social work students. A structured questionnaire was administered to 277 social work students in one…

Advancement of human rights is a core competency in the social work curriculum. Presented is a model to teach policy practice from a human rights perspective based on a violence-against-women delegation visit to Guatemala. Postdelegation policy advocacy responses included White House and State Department briefings on the problems, including…

The global nature of social problems indicates how important it is for social workers to be involved in international issues. For example, overseas experience in social work programs is in consonance with the Council on Social Work Education's emphasis on global context of social work practice. In view of this, some schools of social work are…

The article summarizes a longitudinal case study of the very first Israeli program in social work targeted to the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox Jewish) population (1997-1999). The program's success played an important role in the last decade's dramatic change of attitude in the Israeli Council for Higher Education toward social work education…

Given the United States' population changes and the increasing impact of globalization, international context and experience in the MSW curriculum are essential. Gaining popularity as a vehicle for such experience are short-term international courses, defined as educational trips outside the United States lasting from 1 to 3 weeks. To achieve…

Empathy is a familiar term in social work education, although how to teach and learn empathy is not well documented. Equally, how non-indigenous Australian practitioners learn empathic regard for indigenous peoples living with the crippling legacies of colonialism is not commonly described in the literature. The primary aim of the classroom-based…

Cyber counseling is a new and growing medium for offering mental health services to children and youth. However, there is a lack of identification of the core competencies required to provide effective online counseling. A school of social work, in partnership with a national service agency providing online counseling to children and youth,…

China's social work education dates back to the 1920s, but the profession disappeared for 36 years after the establishment of the People's Republic of China. Not until the late 1980s was social work education in China revived. At the turn of the new century, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the State Council supported the…

Globalization, internationalization, and regionalization affect domestic social work. This paper explores how undergraduate students perceive international aspects of their social work education. A questionnaire was distributed to social work undergraduates in Stockholm, Sweden (n = 97), and Darmstadt, Germany (n = 43). Results showed that a…

How might U.S. social work students' perceptions of HIV/AIDS differ from those of social work students in sub-Saharan Africa? Furthermore, what can students learn from hearing how students from other countries view them? Social work students in the United States, Botswana, and Malawi were video-recorded; they then viewed the videos of students at…