The 2022 Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS) from the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) definitively identifies anti-racism as a necessary component of social work education. This change supports an effort to ensure that coming generations of social workers are more than culturally competent, but rather actively anti-racist…

This study sought to respond to the increased number of mature students in social work education and the understudied topic of their experiences. The research deployed semi- structured interviews and thematic analysis to explore the benefits, challenges, and needs of mature students (N = 19) over the age of 30 in a Canadian Bachelor of Social Work…

Field education provides students with the opportunity to supplement classroom learning with the hands-on practice needed to be successful after graduation. However, in recent years, field education has encountered several challenges including a changing societal environment, placement scarcity in the face of increased enrollment, and strict…

Although social work, as a profession, has increasingly emphasized the importance of evidence-based practice (EBP), social work students do not consistently learn to infuse EBP as a process in their daily practice, contributing to low EBP uptake in the field. Communicating evidence to clients is an ethical imperative for informed consent and a…

Given the increasing value placed on research among social work practitioners, and that field education is primarily responsible for the integration of social work values, knowledge, and practice, it is essential that research skills be incorporated into BSW and MSW field practica. In 2020, a team of faculty co-investigators and students explored…

Social work pedagogy recognizes the educational value of experiential learning for the professional development of social workers, with a particularly rich experiential learning literature related to clinical work and field education. This study evaluates an experiential learning activity for large undergraduate courses in another area: social…

Peer-to-peer role-play in social work education continues to have widespread use in the teaching of generalist social work skills. For many students, however, the unfamiliarity of role-playing the client in conjunction with discussing clinical concerns may lead them to become emotionally dysregulated during the social work-client encounter. To…

Being a social worker requires facing many social upheavals, juggling with organizational changes, and working with various populations with increasing complex social issues. Future social workers must quickly familiarize themselves with the conditions of the practice. In order to do so, it is essential to provide students with multiple…

In 2019, three Black social work instructors simultaneously taught a required anti-oppressive practice (AOP) course to a cohort of undergraduate social work students. Through collective autoethnography (CAE), we sought to deepen our understanding of our experience within the classroom and how our identity as Black women was negotiated within the…

Historic and systemic anti-Black racism are rooted in political, economic, ontological, epistemological, and cultural foundations of Canadian society. The normativity of whiteness and white supremacy are prevalent in social work programs across Canada despite the profession's commitment to social justice and anti-oppressive practice. Advancing…

It has been postulated that field education is the signature pedagogy of social work education. Practicums are paramount in assisting social work students to develop the unique skills and competencies required for professional practice. Traditionally, field education in social work has occurred within the context of social service agencies…

Field practicum plays a central role in social work education by socializing social work students to the profession and facilitating the integration of theoretical knowledge with skill development. Students can be apprehensive about beginning practicum and often lack adequate formal preparation for the practicum experience. This study evaluates…

This article examines the challenges faced by social work field instructors in two Canadian provinces. The results are based on the responses from 239 field instructors to a questionnaire survey. Findings highlight student difficulties, administrative issues with the social work schools, and practicum setting challenges. These demands hinder the…

Grounded theory is a popular methodological approach in social work research, especially by doctoral students conducting qualitative research. The approach, however, is not always used consistently or as originally designed, compromising the quality of the research. The aim of the current study is to assess the quality of recent Canadian social…

This article reports on a study of student experiences of a Walls to Bridges (W2B) class taught by Faculty of Social Work instructors in a Canadian women's prison. The Walls to Bridges (W2B) program is based on the U. S. Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program and brings students from the university together with students from the prison to study for a…