Selecting Field Placements
Selecting a field placement site is one of the most stressful activities of your graduate program. This process creates significant anxiety as we attach such importance to these curricular experiences where we get to bridge our classroom content with our practice-based settings. We recognize that many of you have pursued an MSW degree because you are anxious to get working in clinical practice settings by engaging in therapeutic interventions. This makes sense because the MSW is the bridge between your capacity to engage in specific practice behaviors that are only afforded individuals who achieve not only the MSW but a clinical license to practice social work. We can see how much importance we then place on this process.
However, it is important that you approach your field education experience from a place of competency development- reflecting the scaffolding of competencies necessary to engage in effective clinical social work practice.
In every social work program, we are governed by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). The CSWE provides us with the Educational Policies and Accreditation Standards. Within this important document, they outline the following social work competencies that every program must ensure every student achieves prior to graduation.
CSWE Social Work Competencies
Competency 1: Demonstrate Ethical & Professional Behavior
Competency 2: Engage Diversity & Difference in Practice
Competency 3: Advance Human Rights & Social, Economic, & Environmental Justice
Competency 4: Engage in Practice-Informed Research & Research-Informed Practice
Competency 5: Engage in Policy Practice
Competency 6: Engage with Individuals, Families, Groups, Organizations, & Communities
Competency 7: Assess Individuals, Families, Groups, Organizations, & Communities
Competency 8: Intervene with Individuals, Families, Groups, Organizations, & Communities
Competency 9: Evaluate Individuals, Families, Groups, Organizations, & Communities
These competencies are important, as they build upon each other and mutually impact your personal and professional development. This also means that you need to begin at the beginning- you have to first understand contexts, systems, and structures that amplify the trajectories and experiences of individuals, families, and groups in order to effectively intervene. You must understand the organizational systems and funding policies that drive both your scope of work and how that work is paid in order to develop new and innovative approaches to prevention or intervention.
For everyone, the most important experience includes enough time and experience developing your engagement skills. Then you build assessment skills. Finally you begin to develop intervention skills. Most of the time we are anxious to get to the intervention skills (in our mind the “doing” part of the work); however, in our haste to do the “fun” stuff, we often overlook the fact that we need to develop specialized skills of engagement and assessment in order to even consider interventions. Therefore, you want to focus your field experiences on building your engagement and assessment skills. Intervention skills often come through your post-master’s experience anyways. These are advanced…can’t run the marathon if you can’t run a 5k.
Foundation Field Goals
The first thing to remember about your MSW field experience is that this is preparation and experience for your FIRST job.
Therefore, when looking for your foundation field site, you should consider the following.
- Approach your foundation experience as an opportunity to gain access to contexts, populations, and settings. The idea is to complement and expand your existing experience, not duplicate.
- Choose a site that will round out, complement, or expand on existing experience. If you want to work in hospitals, take a foundation practicum in a hospital even if it is doing something that you are not ultimately wishing to pursue. This experience provides necessary context of hospital social work that you will use in your first interview.
- Ask yourself- “Does this opportunity provide me with knowledge, skills, and competencies beyond what I already possess?” If the answer is no, then chose a different opportunity.
Concentration Field Goals
Concentration field experience prepares you for your FIRST job, and helps set your career trajectory.
Therefore, you should focus your concentration practicum search on exploring opportunities that deepen your engagement and assessment skills. These are the skills most important to landing your first jobs. If you are able to locate a mental health concentration practicum that also includes intervention, then this is a bonus; however, absolutely not necessary as I will explain below.
Clinical social work practice is governed by state regulations through the licensing process. Therefore, our scope of practice is limited until we have obtained the appropriate training, supervision, and experience to practice independently. This is recognized when one achieves the terminal clinical license for one’s respective state. Until this point, to engage in clinical social work practice, we must be under the supervision of a clinically licensed social worker.
For example, you cannot diagnosis until you obtain a clinical license. You may not engage in clinical social work interventions (DBT for example) independently without a license. Additionally, the policies that direct funding limits social workers’ scope of practice, therefore, prevent billing for clinical social work activities without a license. This, in turn, impacts the clinical social work career trajectory. Most “clinical social worker” or “therapist” positions require a clinical license to be eligible for positions. Therefore, your first two years should be focused on engaging in direct social work practice that counts towards obtaining a license. For many, this is clinical case management. This is a typical and expected career pathway.
In the end, you should narrow your search to positions that allow you to have client interaction, even if limited to assessment and group co-facilitation. Case management skills are critical competencies that will also position you extremely well for landing your first position post-MSW.
Local Field Education Sites
There are many mental health field education possibilities. Meet with your field adviser to explore matches between your populations and practice interest areas. Examples of mental health placements may include:
- BJC Behavioral Health
- Comtrea
- Compass Health
- Behavioral Health Network
- Youth in Need
- Sparlin Mental Health
- Our Little Haven
- Provident Behavioral Health
- UMSL Counseling Services
- Children’s Advocacy Center
- SIUE Counseling Services
- Queen of Peace Center
- and many more…
