Good, Bad, Ugly or Just Poor? Reactions to Social Work.

As I have prepared for graduate school, I have gotten an interesting range of reactions to social work. The most negative interaction occurred in conversation with a medical student.  We had just met and were talking pleasantly until he asked me what I did.  When I told him I was about to start a social work masters, for a moment I could see a look on his face that said, "you're doing WHAT?  Why would you ever want to do THAT lowly thing?"  However, knowing this was hardly a caring response, he mastered himself, and we continued to talk agreeably.

Admittedly, in comparison to the rigors of medical school, an MSW must seem pretty tame.  Two years in a grad program, not including a thesis, and a licensing exam.  Hardly on the same level, right?  Now that I think about it, I can remember a similar disdain on the faces of my sociology professors in college, as they talked about  social work.  After all, sociology requires "hard thinking" and, if you really want to go somewhere, getting a PhD.  In comparison, social work is hardly rigorous.  Or is it?

More-so than some social sciences, Social Work is an applied field.  The theoretical base is mostly created by other fields such as sociology, psychology, anthropology and political science.  Although we study the theories, the point in social work is not the theories themselves, but what they mean when you come face to face with the people you are trying to help.  When you look in the face of a suffering person, how do you work with them to reach a better quality of life?  Although this does not necessarily require years spent in academic thesis-writing or fact-memorization, it requires a different, just as essential, process of education.

When I spoke to veteran social workers, I got some very positive perspectives, but admittedly others communicated things like "this profession rung me dry, but now I'm stuck in it" and "its full of disappointments and barriers, but every once in a while there's a victory that makes it all worth it."  Easy?  Lacking in blood, sweat, and tears?  Hardly.  Although I can say without hesitation that school is going to be plenty challenging, the real challenge comes on the other side of school.

Unfortunately, I think the people we seek to serve sometimes have a reaction to the profession as a whole that is also negative.  To the poor and  underprivileged, social workers sometimes seem TOO powerful.  Aren't we the ones on the other side of the phone or the desk when someone applies for welfare?  Aren't we the ones handling the caseloads for medicare and medicaid?  We seem to hold so many facets of their well-being in our hands. Unfortunately, social workers seldom, if ever, set the limits on that kind of aid.  Although we may be the ones to tell a person, "yes" or "no," the reasons for those decisions are usually determined by government or agency policy, often putting us in difficult positions.

Undoubtedly the most common casual objection to social work I encountered, however, was the question, "you DO realize social workers don't make very much money, DON'T you?"  Sometimes I wanted to laugh.  As a culture, do we REALLY think that is what matters most?  Well, how often do we express the value we give to something by how much we're willing to pay for it, or automatically assign more value to something more expensive?  In the case of a profession, how much do we honor people according to the level of salary they receive?  As far as I know, the underlying reason for social worker's salaries is that we tend to work for organizations with tight budgets and serve populations on the least-advantaged side of the spectrum.  However, does the fact that our salaries are lower than, say, psychologists or psychiatrists, automatically cause us to be seen as less valuable in the eyes of society?  While in some cases the answer is yes, thankfully most of my conversations have included a very positive response to my chosen profession.

Falling in Love: How I Came to Social Work

I have just completed my first week in social work grad school, and every moment has been a reminder that this is exactly where I want to be.  Not to put too fine a point on it, I LOVE it!  I have also been asked the question of how I came to social work multiple times.  So here's the story... in brief.  

Given the fact that some social workers can be antagonistic to Christianity, it might be surprising to some to learn that I came to social work through the church.  My parents were missionaries (another bad word among some social scientists) in São Paulo, Brazil, where I grew up, and spent my first years after college.  My parent's early work had a lot to do with providing strategies and mechanisms to help churches become healthier.  Among other things, they provided training and material for small groups.  It was in those small groups that I formed my most influential teenage relationships, and where I first discovered the power of empathetic listening joined with prayer.  

Skip forward.  I'm a freshman psychology major at Wheaton College and don't hit it off well with the only clinical psych prof, as she doesn't seem to take seriously the importance of considering spirituality in a clinical setting.  Meanwhile, my gen ed Intro to Sociology professor blows open my vision of the world with my first formal contact with the ways systems determine aspects of people's lives.  I change majors.

After college, I struggle for some years with where I will go professionally.  The change from psychology to sociology throws open a gamut of options in social justice or community organizing, but with a wider set of possibilities, I find myself wandering somewhat lost.  While earning my bread in administrative positions, I volunteer with several different organizations, but fail to find a place where I can see myself long-term.  More and more, I discover my personality is better suited to one-on-one or small group counseling then to community or systems change.

The more I delve into the idea of working with individuals for their transformation, the better I like it.  My personal experience confirms that this is a good area for me.  However, counseling in the state of Pennsylvania requires a masters-level license.  I explore the possibilities of a masters in counseling or in social work, and discover that the latter not only provides more job options than the former, but merges my love for individual counseling with my college-produced passion for the role of larger systems.  Not wanting to leave Pittsburgh made the University of Pittsburgh, with a program among the best in the country, the perfect answer.