Praxis Makes Perfect: Approaches to Incorporating Race and Racism in Social Work Practice Courses

Praxis Makes Perfect:  Approaches to Incorporating Race and Racism in Social Work Practice Courses

Abstract

Background and Purpose:

Clinical social work, a specialized field within social work, has been criticized for not being aligned with the larger mission of social work, to address the needs of marginalized and oppressed groups (Maschi, Baer, & Turner, 2011). Furthermore, it has drawn from a medical, pathology-based model of treatment (Maschi, Baer, & Turner, 2011). This research attempts to address these criticisms and situate the field within its contemporary context.

This study explores how clinical social work educators defined race and racism and conveyed their understanding of these concepts through classroom teaching of advanced practice courses. This study offers insight about how clinical social work faculty are transmitting the mission of social work through their instruction and explores their efforts to incorporate issues of race and racism. 

Methods:

Fifteen in-depth interviews with social work faculty who teach advanced practice at historical clinical social work schools and schools with a strong clinical social work were conducted. Participants were asked to review a case vignette about a Puerto Rican college student named Maria and using the case, explicitly describe and demonstrate their classroom methods for engaging students, their assumptions and understandings of race and racism, and the ways it may be impacting the experience of this particular client. Participants in this study included full-time or adjunct faculty who have taught 2nd year/advanced clinical social work practice courses for at least 3 years in an accredited Master’s in Social Work program.  The sample included 4 participants who identified as men and 11 participants who identified as women. 3 participants identified as people of color, in particular Black and Latino, while 12 participants identified as White.

Interviews were transcribed verbatim by a professional transcriber. Line-by-line coding helped create broad themes and categories and then focused coding was used to reexamine the data using the constant compare method and other grounded theory approaches.

Findings:

Data analysis revealed that participants primarily focused on clinical symptomology, diagnosis, and assessment and secondarily, relating these three concepts to ethnicity and culture. Many of the participants constructed an “immigrant” narrative about client and did not take into account Puerto Rico’s unique relationship to the United States, as a commonwealth territory. Participants operated from a cultural competent framework, focusing on Maria’s ethnic or cultural identity and only if asked directly about race and racism, did they incorporate a discussion of these concepts in their discussion.

Conclusion and Implications:

This study suggests that a majority of the participants do not think about or teach critically about issues of race and racism nor are they aware of the many opportunities to incorporate issues of race and racism into clinical social work practice material. In response to these findings, it would be important to imagine ways of transforming clinical social work curriculum not only to take into account issues of race and racism but also operate from an intersectional analysis.