Ethics

  • SSW ET 753: Ethics and the Social Work Profession
    This required seminar is intended to inspire the moral imagination of social work students, and prepare them for competent and compassionate ethical practice as professionals. Ethics and the Social Work Profession (ET 753), examines the issues of social work professionalism, the process of becoming a social work professional, the tensions inherent in the goals of social work, and the ways these interrelate to produce conflicts of values and ethics in social work practice. The course focuses on acquiring and practicing the skills of ethical decision-making, including values clarification, application of ethical theory, utilization of codes of ethics, and models of ethical analysis. Both clinical and macro aspects of social work are explored, with an emphasis on the contemporary challenges of practice in multicultural and urban settings. Issues of self-care, impairment, licensure, malpractice, whistle-blowing and other professional challenges are explored. The course is set in the advanced curriculum as an integrative capstone, designed to be concurrent with the student's final semester in the MSW program.