THE MISSION OF THE FIELD EDUCATION DEPARTMENT IS TO PARTNER WITH COMMUNITY
PRACTITIONERS AND MSASS FACULTY TO PROVIDE STUDENTS WITH OPPORTUNITIES FOR ACADEMIC INTEGRATION IN
A DYNAMICALLY ORIENTED PRACTICE ARENA.
Field Education affords students opportunities to apply theoretical concepts from
the classroom to professional practice sites structured to enhance opportunities for skill
demonstration and application. These collective experiences provide students with a forum to
develop social work skills, integrate and operationalize the values and ethics inherent in
professional practice, and confront social injustice as self-reflective, competent developing
practitioners.
Field Education provides a forum for students to integrate the knowledge, skills
and values that comprise the core of the professional social work practice with a self identity as
competent beginning professionals. The practice setting affords students opportunities to apply
didactic theory to practice, give and receive feedback regarding skill development, and experience
the realities of the social work profession. There is the potential for a mutual exchange of
practical and theoretical knowledge that may serve to enhance innovative change in both the
clinical and academic venues. The Field Education Department endorses this expansive view of the
opportunities that students and Field Instructors share to re-define both social work education and
social work practice for the future.
The Eight Abilities form the structure of the Field
Learning Contract which is developed each semester through a collaborative process
involving students, Field Instructors and Field Advisors. This document captures the field learning
opportunities essential to maximize the integration of the academic and practice experience central
to graduate social work education. Students are encouraged and expected to articulate and
incorporate the skills necessary for successful field performance in the
Learning Contract. Opportunities for the development of critical thinking skills,
self-assessment, offering and receiving professional feedback and flexibility of approach are
valued elements inherent to the field site.
CASE defines education as a "transforming" opportunity. The Field Education
Department provides students with the contextual format for this transformation to be realized.
A pdf version of this statement can be downloaded here:
Mission Statement
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