COMPETENCIES AND PRACTICE BEHAVIORS
FOUNDATION YEAR:
Competency I: Identify as a professional social worker and conduct oneself accordingly
- Practices personal reflection and self-correction to assure optimal client care.
- Understands the role of the professional social worker and functions effectively in that role within the agency and team structure.
- Demonstrates professional demeanor in behavior, appearance and communication.
- Demonstrates an awareness of the importance of boundaries and practices accordingly.
- Actively engages in supervision and incorporates supervisory feedback into practice.
Competency II: Apply social work ethical principles to guide professional practice
- Understands and adheres to the value base of the social work profession and its ethical standards.
- Identifies and manages personal values in a way that allows professional values to guide practice.
- Recognizes ethical dilemmas inherent to the practice setting and seeks out appropriate assistance in attending to them.
Competency III: Apply critical thinking to inform and communicate professional judgments
- Distinguishes, appraises and integrates multiple sources of knowledge, including research-based knowledge and practice wisdom.
- Identifies different models of assessment, prevention, intervention and evaluation.
- Demonstrates effective oral and written communication in working with individuals, families, groups, organizations, communities and colleagues.
- Demonstrates an awareness of the importance of boundaries and practices accordingly.
Competency IV: Engage diversity and difference in practice
- Recognizes the extent to which a culture’s structures and values may oppress, marginalize, alienate or create or enhance privilege and power.
- Identifies knowledge gaps and utilizes professional literature.
- Monitors and works toward elimination of influence of personal biases and values in working with diverse groups.
- Takes into account clients’ and one’s own race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation and physical ability.
- Engages clients as a resource to further understand dimensions of difference.
Competency V: Advance human rights and social and economic justice
- Identifies oppression and injustice affecting clients and communities.
- In the context of human rights and social and economic injustice, demonstrates skill as an advocate.
Competency VI: Engage in research-informed practice and practice-informed research
- Generates questions for further inquiry from practice.
- Identifies evidence informed / based practices utilized in agency setting.
Competency VII: Apply knowledge of human behavior and the social environment
- Demonstrates and applies knowledge of human behavior across the life span.
- Identifies conceptual frameworks that guide assessment, intervention and evaluation.
Competency VIII: Engage in policy practice to advance social and economic well-being and to deliver effective social work services
- Identifies and analyzes specific social / agency policies and understands their impact on service delivery and client well-being.
- Recognizes relationships between funding sources, public policies and client systems.
Competency IX: Respond to contexts that shape practice
- Is curious and informed about evolving and emerging trends and changes in populations, scientific and technological development and service delivery.
- Recognizes that the context of practice is dynamic and has knowledge and skills to respond proactively.
Competency X: Engage, assess, intervene and evaluate with individuals, families, groups, organizations and communities.
- 1 a) Engagement: Uses empathy and other interpersonal skills to develop effective working relationships.
- 1 b) Engagement: Develops a mutually agreed-on focus of work and desired outcomes
- 2 a) Assessment: Collects, organizes and interprets client data for written / oral communication.
- 2 b) Assessment: Assesses client strengths and challenges.
- 2 c) Assessment: Develops mutually agreed-on intervention goals and indicators of successful outcome.
- 3 a) Intervention: Helps clients gain greater self awareness, facilitate growth and change and resolve problems.
- 3 b) Intervention: Implements prevention interventions that enhance client capacities.
- 3 c) Intervention: Facilitates transitions and endings.
- 4 a) Evaluation: Critically analyzes, monitors and evaluates intervention.
YEAR II / ADVANCED STANDING:
Year II / Advanced Standing students are expected to build on their knowledge and skills from their Foundation Year and demonstrate a skill level that reflects a more complex understanding and application of all of the Competencies and Practice Behaviors listed above. With a concentration in clinical social work advanced year students are expected to broaden and deepen the assessment and intervention skills learned in the first year. Students move towards greater integration and analysis of theory and practice, a more conscious use of self and increased autonomy. In addition to the Foundation Year Competencies and Practice Behaviors, the following Practice Behaviors are to be demonstrated in the Year II / Advanced Standing placement year:
Competency I: Identify as a professional social worker and conduct oneself accordingly
- Identifies professional strengths and challenges and makes plans for career learning.
Competency II: Apply social work ethical principles to guide professional practice
- Uses supervision and consultation to make ethical decisions, applying standards of the NASW Code of Ethics and, as applicable, the IFSW/IASSW Principles; tolerates ambiguity in ethical conflicts.
Competency III: Apply critical thinking to inform and communicate professional judgments
- Identifies and evaluates different theoretical perspectives, assessment and intervention models; differentially apply to client situations.
Competency IV: Engage diversity and difference in practice
- Demonstrates efforts to address issues of difference with clients and colleagues to enhance effectiveness of working relationships.
Competency V: Advance human rights and social and economic justice
- Shows skills in practice at the individual or organizational level that address institutional and societal barriers. Applies knowledge to treatment planning and intervention.
Competency VI: Engage in research-informed practice and practice-informed research
- Uses an evidence informed process to identify best practices and to apply those practices differentially in clinical assessment and interventions with clients.
Competency VII: Apply knowledge of human behavior and the social environment
- Synthesizes and differentially applies theories of human behavior with multi axial diagnostic classification systems to guide assessment, formulation and clinical practice.
Competency VIII: Engage in policy practice to advance social and economic well-being and to deliver effective social work services
- Demonstrates skills in communicating the impact of policies to clients / stakeholders. Works toward policy change.
Competency IX: Respond to contexts that shape practice
- Through various activities including leadership, influences and promotes changes in service delivery and practice to improve the quality of social services.
Competency X: Engage, assess, intervene and evaluate with individuals, families, groups, organizations and communities.
- 1 c) Engagement: Develops a culturally informed therapeutic relationship attending to the interpersonal factors affecting the therapeutic alliance.
- 2 d) Assessment: Develops in depth assessments and complex formulations of the client / system that include an analysis of the presenting problem, the socio-cultural context and the issues related to economic and social justice.
- 2 e) Assessment: Utilizes differential and multi axial diagnostic tools to develop an accurate diagnostic statement.
- 3 d) Intervention: Designs and implements clinically appropriate interventions that consider the client’s strengths, issues and resources and needs, and address the problems at a variety of systems levels.
- 3 e) Intervention: Uses advanced interviewing skills to explore emotionally charged content, work with resistance, interpret underlying themes and interactional behaviors.
- 4 b) Evaluation: Modifies intervention strategies based on continuous evaluation of the work.
- 4 c) Evaluation: Evaluates client progress and outcomes.
