Social Work Field Instruction in Modern Practice

Introduction: Field Is the Heart of Social Work Education
Samuel B. Little

Chapter 1: Social Work Field Education during COVID-19
Samuel B. Little, Laura L. Loessner, and Caroline Harmon-Darrow

Chapter 2: Social Work Field Education: Seeking Balance Inside and Outside
Janice Davis

Chapter 3: Preparing Students to Engage with and in Culturally Diverse Communities
Mirian E. Ofonedu and Wendy Jones

Chapter 4: Infusing Cultural Humility in Social Work Field Education through the Development of Community Partnerships
Roslynn Scott-Adams and Danielle S. Parker

Chapter 5: Prioritizing Cultural Humility in a Social Work Field Education Seminar
Laura L. Loessner

Chapter 6: Conceptualizing Accommodations for Students with Diverse Needs in Field
Margaux Delotte-Bennett and Lynda Myers

Chapter 7: Field Placements Serving Survivors of Human Trafficking
Nadine Finigan-Carr and Caroline Harmon-Darrow

Chapter 8: Service Placements with Persons Experiencing Homelessness
Donald Burnes and Samuel B. Little

Chapter 9: Trauma-Informed Field Education: Preparing Students for Practice
Molly Everett Davis

Chapter 10: Burnout and Empowerment of Field Instructors
Jennifer Siegel, Lauren McCarthy, Orrin Ware, Sol Baik, and Ivana Alexander

Chapter 11: Mindfulness and Self-Care in Social Work Field Instruction
Shanza Isom

Chapter 12: Field Education in Small Towns and Rural Communities
Kerri Shaw and Temi Chohan

Chapter 13: International Field Placements: Perspectives from Rajagiri College of Social Sciences (Autonomous), Kerala, India
Kiran Thampi, I. P. Sunirose, and Caroline Long

Chapter 14: Social Work Practice Learning in England
Jackie Yaskey

Chapter 15: Special Considerations for Online Social Work Programs: Establishing and Maintaining Quality Field Education across Distance and Time Zones
Beverly Araujo Dawson, Clark Shah-Nelson, and Matthea Marquart

Chapter 16: Field Education Internship Management Systems: Data Collection, Placement Assistance, and Statistical Reporting
Kristen Mitchell Samuels

Conclusion: Advancing Field Education through Collaborative Partnerships
Samuel B. Little

Ivana Alexander, MEd, MSW, LICSW, is a doctoral candidate in social work at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. She is also an experienced social worker, providing treatment and intensive case management in both acute hospital and outpatient mental health settings.

Sol Baik, PhD, MA, specializes in gerontology. Her interests include social determinants of health, neighborhood contexts, health disparities, and community-based care for the aging population and people with dementia.

Donald W. Burnes, MAT, PhD, is the co-founder of the Burnes Institute for Poverty Research at the Colorado Center on Law and Policy. He is the author of three books on homelessness. He is currently working with a national group that is exploring possible ways to persuade people to change attitudes about those experiencing homelessness.

Temi Chohan completed a graduate degree in speech language pathology. She also completed a graduate assistantship in the Department of Social Work at Ohio State University. Her work focused on projects that addressed internal bias experience by healthcare workers. She is currently a speech language pathologist in Cleveland, Ohio.

Janice M. Davis, PhD, MSW, LCSW-C, is the director of clinical education at Howard University School of Social Work. Her research interests include health disparities, first-generation and nontraditional college students, and well-being. She has more than 31 years of clinical experience.

Molly Everett Davis, MSW, EdD, A-CTTP, is a past associate professor in the Department of Social Work, George Mason University. She has been a Council on Social Work Education site visitor and has expertise in field education, gerontology, trauma-informed organizational change, cultural competency, and disaster behavioral health.

Beverly Araujo Dawson, MSW, PhD, is a professor in the School of Social Work at Adelphi University and the program director of the Online MSW Program. Her research discrimination on health disparities among Latinx individuals.

Margaux Delotte-Bennett, MSW, LICSW, is the director of field education for the baccalaureate and master’s programs at Gallaudet University’s Department of Social Work. Her work experience has focused on the needs of youth and young adults’ physical well-being, sexual health, homelessness, and LGBTQ+ human rights. She promotes accessibility for social work students who are deaf and hard of hearing, deafblind, and deaf+ (students who are deaf and have other disabilities or diagnoses).

Nadine M. Finigan-Carr, PhD, is a prevention research scientist focused on the application of behavioral and social science perspectives to research on contemporary health problems, especially those that disproportionately affect people of color. She is an expert on minor human trafficking and sexual exploitation. Dr. Finigan-Carr also is executive director of the Center for Violence Prevention University of Maryland, Baltimore, and the author of Linking Health and Education for African American Students’ Success (Routledge Press).

Caroline Harmon-Darrow, PhD, MSW, is an assistant professor at the Rutgers University School of Social Work. A community mediator and nonprofit leader for 24 years, she researches conflict resolution and other interventions to reduce violence, victimization, and incarceration.

Shanza A. Isom, MSW, is director of engaged transformative learning at the School of Social Work, Virginia Commonwealth University. Her areas of expertise include social work field education, holistic well-being, self-care, and mindfulness. She regularly facilitates workshops and delivers presentations to faculty, students, the community, and local/regional organizations.

Wendy Jones, MEd, MSW, is an assistant professor at the Center for Child & Human Development, Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities, Georgetown University. Ms. Jones’ clinical experiences with families and children from marginalized communities inform her teaching approaches and content with first-year medical students in community-based settings.

Caroline Long, PhD, retired as an associate professor, School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore, where she chaired the children specialization and directed the global engagement program. She also chaired the IV-E for Public Child Welfare Education Consortium for Maryland.

Matthea Marquart, MSSW, is the assistant dean of online education at the Columbia University School of Social Work, where she leads a team responsible for the online MSW program. Her interests are inclusive and innovative teaching, online education, social work education, and faculty development.

Lauren P. McCarthy, PhD, MSW, LCSW, received her PhD from the School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore, in 2022. Her research interests lie in ensuring equitable access to quality mental healthcare for all children and their families to reduce the need for residential treatment settings.

Lynda Rae Myers, PhD, MSW, LCSW-C, is a retired assistant professor at Gallaudet University. She is third-generation deaf/hard of hearing. She has served as a social worker based in community social service agencies for more than 30 years, primarily serving the deaf; hard of hearing; and late deaf, coda, and deafblind communities and their families.

Danielle S. Parker, MSW, is director of social work field education at Coppin State University. In her role, she manages the field education office, coordinates students’ placement needs, and establishes new community partnerships. She enjoys working with students in assisting them with understanding the dynamic social work profession and sharing the importance of field education as the signature pedagogy.

Kristen Mitchell Samuels, EdD, MSW, MS, MEd, is the director of field education for the University of Phoenix’s fully online BSSW program. Her research interests include technology diffusion and best practices to develop, implement, instruct, evaluate, and support the field education curriculum.

Roslynn Scott-Adams, PhD, LCSW-C, is a clinical assistant professor at The Catholic University of America. She enjoys using her years of practice experience and love for the social work profession to help students begin to learn to practice social work. Since joining the National Catholic School of Social Service, she has focused on helping students embrace the idea of becoming culturally humble social work practitioners.

Clark Shah-Nelson, DBA, MA, has developed, taught, coordinated and managed distance online learning programs. Currently, he is assistant dean of instructional design and technology at the University of Maryland School of Social Work. His recent research publications focus on collaborative technologies and human resources management and knowledge-sharing technologies to foster virtual team productivity for globally dispersed workforces.

Kerri Shaw, MSW, LISW-S, CHW, is the community health worker lead for the Ohio University Ohio Alliance for Population Health. Shaw has 20 years of practice experience in rural southeast Ohio as a school social worker, counselor, program developer, and educator.

Jennifer Siegel, PhD, MSW, is assistant professor and field director at Calvin University. She received her doctorate in social work at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, under the mentorship of Dr. Nalini Negi. Her research is focused on contributing to the empirical and theoretical understanding of behavioral health outcomes of immigrant and refugee children and families. Specifically, her research goals are focused on understanding how structural conditions shaped by immigration status and ethnic minority status impact the health and behavioral health outcomes of immigrant and refugee children and families, including anxiety, depression, PTSD, and risky substance use behaviors. She also performs evaluation activities on programs for unaccompanied immigrant and refugee children, specifically evaluating program effectiveness and health and well-being outcomes of program participants.

I. P. Sunirose teaches courses in the School of Social Work at the Rajagiri College of Social Sciences in Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam. She has conducted research on child care and protection. Among her research interests are child rights, women in leadership, and family violence. She is a consultant to various forums and a member of anti–sexual harassment committees in both government and the corporate sector.

Kiran Thampi, MPhil, PhD, is the assistant professor in the Department of Social Work, Rajagiri College of Social Sciences, and also the assistant director of the Office of International Relations. He is currently the project lead, partnering with Israel and Australia, in the international project funded by IASSW. His research and publication interests include nongovernmental organizations, social audits, mental health of professionals and youth, and international social work.

Orrin Ware, PhD, MSW, is an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Social Work. As an applied public health researcher with a background as a licensed clinical social worker, he has more than a decade of experience providing treatment services to people living with cancer, HIV, mental health disorders, and substance use disorders.

Jackie Yaskey, BA Hons, MA, DIPSW, SFHEA, is senior lecturer and program leader in social work at the University of Greenwich. Her areas of expertise include social work skills and practice learning, law and policy, values and diversity, social work theories and direct work with children, employability, and transition to professional social work practice. She is a senior fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Samuel B. Little, PhD, is the associate dean emeritus for field education at the School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore; an associate adjunct professor at Howard University’s School of Social Work in Washington, DC; and founding president of the National Alliance for Resident Services in Affordable and Assisted Housing. He has experience in directing field education programs, combined with administering public housing programs globally, having served as associate deputy director at the Housing Authority of Baltimore City, executive director of resident services at the District of Columbia Housing Authority, and executive vice president for resident and community services at the Philadelphia Housing Authority. He has managed research projects on public housing topics, collaborated with foundation officials on cutting-edge capacity building programs to enhance the well-being of families, prepared testimony for Congressional hearings, and developed affordable housing policies and redevelopment plans. Dr. Little previously served as executive vice president of the Alliance Network based in Denver, Colorado. In this role, he developed community-based partnerships in Central America and partnered with redevelopment organizations to transform blighted communities into neighborhoods of choice while creating programs that provide access to education, health, and employment. Dr. Little is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Human Service Organizations: Management, Leadership and Governance. He speaks regularly at public housing and social work conferences on capacity building programs for families. He also serves as an independent third-party monitor for resident council elections and conducts certification training for affordable housing agencies. The National Association of Social Workers Foundation honored Dr. Little in 2024 as a Social Work Pioneer. This prestigious award recognizes him as a powerful advocate for equitable public housing, and for his contributions to field education and social work research.

Laura L. Loessner, LICSW, LCSW-C, is a clinical associate professor and director of field education at the School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore, where she is responsible for the field education curriculum and the academic and administrative functions of practicum experiences for more than 850 students, in 745 community partnerships with more than 4,000 field instructors. In 2019, Ms. Loessner led the development and launch of a new field seminar rooted in cultural humility and antioppressive practice for nearly 400 foundation-level MSW students that continues each year since its inception. More recently, she has worked to develop methods for preparing social work students for success in practicum and practice including simulations, learning labs and mentoring models of teaching for liaisons and field instructors. Ms. Loessner has served on the executive board for the Mid-Atlantic Consortium of Directors of Field Education for the past decade, is a board-approved clinical supervisor, and has been a licensed clinical social worker since 1996. In her 34 years of professional social work experience, Ms. Loessner has developed expertise in clinical intervention and supervision, nonprofit management, professional development, and experiential learning for MSW and BSW students while employing a “justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion” lens. Her work includes bias research at the Urban Institute and directing nonprofit organizations for interpersonal violence, special education, and community-based health and mental healthcare. For more than 18 years, Ms. Loessner has taught in the classroom and as a graduate social work field instructor in six different schools of social work.

Mirian E. Ofonedu, PhD, LCSW-C, is the director of training at the Maryland Center for Developmental Disabilities at Kennedy Krieger Institute. She is an associate professor at the School of Graduate Studies, University of Maryland, Baltimore, and in the Department of Mental Health, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University. She is also a faculty affiliate of the Johns Hopkins Wendy Klag Center for Autism and Developmental Disabilities and adjunct professor at the School of Social Work, University of Maryland , Baltimore. Dr. Ofonedu is a psychologist and a licensed clinical social worker, with a specialization in service to children, youth, and families. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA) and served as APA Division 37 program chair, coordinator for task force on diversity initiatives and liaison to the committee on international relations in psychology. Dr. Ofonedu currently serves as chair for APA Division 37 Diverse, Racial, Ethnic, and Multicultural Special Interest Group and is a mentor for the APA Global Psychology Alliance, Global Psychology Learning Leadership Institute. She is also a master trainer for the ACT Raising Safe Kids, a program developed and coordinated by APA and is a recipient of the Association of University Centers on Disabilities Multicultural Council Award for Leadership in Diversity and the Kennedy Krieger Institute Social Justice Award. Dr. Ofonedu contributes to the field through her clinical, research, and training expertise at local, state, national, and international levels. Her work, which spans more than two decades, is inspired by the core values of recognizing and building on the strengths and competencies that exist in a person, family, and community, and being culturally and linguistically responsive to each person’s unique needs for the purpose of creating a more just, inclusive, and equitable society for all.