Cultural competency has been a long held ideal for social work educators and practitioners. However, definitions and approaches to cultural competency vary widely depending on worldview, discipline, and practice context. Within social work and beyond, cultural competency has been challenged for its failure to account for the structural forces that shape individuals' experiences and opportunities. In contrast, the concept ofcultural humility takes into account the fluidity of culture and challenges both individuals and institutions to address inequalities. This article takes a critical look at cultural competence as a concept, examining its explicit and implicit assumptions, and the impact these assumptions have on practitioners. It suggests that cultural humility may offer social work an alternative framework as it acknowledges power differentials between provider and client and challenges institutional-level barriers. The authors advocate a move from a focus on mastery in understanding ‘others’ to a fram...

From Mastery to Accountability: Cultural Humility as an Alternative to Cultural Competence

Mental health stigma operates in society, is internalized by individuals, and is attributed by health professionals. This ethics-laden issue acts as a barrier to individuals who may seek or engage in treatment services. The dimensions, theory, and epistemology of mental health stigma have several implications for the social work profession.

Mental Health Stigma: Society, Individuals, and the Profession

Field education is arguably the most significant component of the social work curriculum in preparing competent, effective, and ethical clinical social workers. Students and alumni characterize it as such, and national accrediting bodies, both in the United States and internationally, recognize its crucial impact on the quality of social work services delivered to the public. In addition, there is likely more scholarship and research conducted on field education than on any other component of the curriculum. And yet, field educators anecdotally describe a crisis in their ability to implement the best pedagogical practices for students. This paper will discuss the developing evidence-base highlighting best practices for field education, the changing context of field education, and analyze current challenges and potential responses.

Field Education for Clinical Social Work Practice: Best Practices and Contemporary Challenges

SummaryCultural competence has commanded respectable attention since its introduction in cross-cultural discourse. Cultural competence has been presented as a framework capable of promoting cultura...

Cultural competence and cultural humility: A critical reflection on key cultural diversity concepts:

During the past several decades, social work practice in the USA and the industrialisedworld has become increasingly politicised—a consequence of political-economic, ideo-logical, demographic and cultural changes. This new political environment is reflectedin all aspects of social work practice, including its underlying assumptions, theoreticalbases, research methods and educational foundation. It influences how all participantsin the service process define needs, implement alternative strategies of helping andevaluate their effectiveness. Persistent misunderstandings about the meaning of politicsand its relationship to professional practice, however, present major obstacles to the de-velopment of effective responses to this dramatic transformation. At the organisationaland societal levels, these misunderstandings discourage challenges to the institutionalstatus quo. At the micro level, they rationalise existing hierarchies between socialservice agencies and service users, and between workers and clients. To counteract# The Author 2012. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf ofThe British Association of Social Workers. All rights reserved.British Journal of Social Work (2012) 1–19

The New Politics of Social Work Practice: Understanding Context to Promote Change

Infusion of aging content into the baccalaureate social work curriculum has received increased consideration recently as a lack of student preparation to work with older adults and rising numbers of this population's need has come to light. Student resistance to working with this population has been well documented. Learning activities on an undergraduate level must meet multiple curricular goals such as teaching assessment skills across the life span. A qualitative content analysis of student interview assignments highlighted themes related to required exposure to seniors. Emergent themes included student inexperience, use of stereotypes of older adults, fear of aging, increased comfort in discussing sensitive or taboo topics, and self-discovery and realization of competence. Requiring interviews with older adults had positive outcomes for the small student sample studied. Implications for future social work education, research, and practice are discussed.

Mandatory Interviews with Older Adults as an Undergraduate Social Work Education Strategy Integrating Generalist Practice Skills and Exposure to Older Adults

Summary Aging enrichment of undergraduate social work curricula ensures that program graduates will be prepared to practice with older adults. This article reports the results of focus group research that was designed to engage social workers from community agencies serving older adults in preparing students to become ‘aging-savvy’ social workers. The workers highlighted the importance of wide-ranging exposure to older adults, the changing needs of older adults, and the importance of increasing students' comfort with self-determination. These findings informed the program's ongoing curricular transformation process through the incorporation of new assignments that enabled increased contact with older adults in a variety of settings.

Lynda R. Sowbel

Papers

Mandatory Interviews with Older Adults as an Undergraduate Social Work Education Strategy Integrating Generalist Practice Skills and Exposure to Older Adults

Bringing the community in: partnerships for aging enrichment.