Incorporating Practice Evaluation With the Field Practicum

Abstract

Social work programs are expected to provide students with the research knowledge, skills, and applications they can use in their practice to develop interventions and evaluate their own practice effectiveness. Based on CSWE's Curriculum Policy Statement and Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards, a rationale for and a model incorporating practice evaluation and research with the field practicum are described here. Several issues concerning implementation, such as alleviating student fears and enlisting agency support as well as the authors' experience incorporating practice research in the field practicum, are presented and discussed.

Teaching Note—Teaching Research Methods: Expanding Practice Evaluation Designs for Social Work Practice

“…To promote the use of more formal evaluation methods within social work practice, Dietz, Westerfelt, and Barton (2004) recommended the integration of a practice evaluation project into the field practicum to facilitate the application of knowledge from research courses to the field. Other researchers also underscore the importance of using field placements as a venue for practicing evaluation skills prior to graduation.…”

Social Work Education and Student Research Projects: A Survey of Program Directors

“…Gambrill (2003) noted a lack of involvement with research within the profession, and Dietz, Westerfelt, and Barton (2004) noted that problems still exist and concluded that "research has shown that students and practicing social workers do not understand or systematically use practice research . .…”

“…Since that time, with a growing emphasis on evidence-based practice, there has been an influx of articles offering specific models and methods for teaching research and supporting student participation in research (Dietz et al, 2004;Jacobson & Goheen, 2006;Rubin & Parrish, 2007b;Smith & Gore, 2006), but few if any explorations of the breadth and type of research education taking place across curricula and various levels of education.…”

“…Although social work research education historically has attempted to prepare students to become competent consumers of research, the last 3 decades have witnessed an increased JSWE-W10-Rubin-4f:JournalFall2006 Tue/January/12/2010 Tue/Jan/12/2010/ 7:00 PM Page 40 emphasis on practice evaluation, and most recently on preparing social workers to be practitioner-researchers (Dietz et al, 2004).…”

“…It did not examine the research content that is taught or measure student learning. These are critical distinctions and based on previous empirical support for the benefits of using hands-on learning for social work research competence (e.g., Dietz et al, 2004), evaluation of learning among educational techniques should be explored. Finally, Bogal and Singer (1981) noted more than 25 years ago that "there needs to be a closer integration of the research sequence into the total curriculum" (p. 49) and noted that research taught by nonsocial work faculty has the potential to separate the research sequence from such an integrated approach.…”