Apply Social Work Ethical Principles To Guide Professional Practice (Other (Not Listed) Sample)

Summative Reflection
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Summative Reflection
Students who have gone through the BSSW program are required to include evidence that demonstrates the competencies that they obtained from their classes, internship placement, and practice courses. Below is a demonstration of how I met the ten competencies originating from the CSWE list of competencies in 2008. I also reflect on two learning products for each to demonstrate how they enabled me to attain these competencies.
Meeting Competencies
Competency 1: Identify as a professional social worker and conduct oneself accordingly
While describing my experiences as an intern in NHELP for completion of my agency assignment, I clearly demonstrated how I practiced as an individual to assure that I grow professionally. Additionally, this learning product captured the ethical decision-making practice behavior of competency one. Therefore, completing my agency assignment allowed me to focus on a client’s ethical dilemma particularly in instances when a client asked for my personal number. Providing the client with my personal number would have been a violation of the NASW ethical standards while failing to do the same had the potential of raising feelings of rejection, loss of trust and premature leave of the program. By initiating objective description of this dilemma to my supervisor and elimination of my individual biases, I was not only able to resolve the situation in an ethical and professional manner but also recognize the significance of consultation and supervision within a social work practice.
When completing my community resource file, I prepared a work situation for UHI Community Care Clinic that demonstrated my efforts to improve how the hospital uses its resources so that they can better serve individuals who had no insurance, VA benefits, County Social Service and had low-income levels. Through the description of the agency (UHI), I was also able to advocate for a just social structure that ensures equitable client access to social work services as well as healthcare within a diverse setting.
Competency 2: Apply social work ethical principles to guide professional practice.
For my simulated interviews, I was required to demonstrate my interviewing techniques through accurate and precise recording of interview sessions. For this assignment, I was able to effectively conduct interviews while paying attention to different interviewing skills such as talking and listening, the structure of beginnings, and exploring. The interview remained objective with individuals of different cultures and effectively addressed different realities for various groups such as oppression to minority groups. While I had my personal biases in a few areas, I was able to effectively manage these biases by remaining objective and ethical. While it seemed nearly impossible to make everyone happy, my simulated interviews demonstrated my ability and commitment to meeting all of the client’s interests and needs. Different codes of ethics also came in handy because all the competencies demonstrated in my simulated interviews were based on the principles laid down on this ethical code.
In my agency assignment, I was able to apply the NASW ethical standards in different circumstances including in a scenario where a client asked for a personal phone number. Additionally, I was able to demonstrate my value for respect for the client, myself and the profession as a whole in this paper as some clients are likely to feel disrespected when they are visited in their homes. The agency assignment also demonstrated how I applied various strategies of ethical reasoning during my internship at NHEP to make ethical decisions.
Competency 3: Apply critical thinking to inform & communicate professional judgments
As a requirement for completing the case assessment assignment, we were to assess a client, his environment and demonstrate skills that can be applied in practical situations. Therefore, I assessed the case of a 52-year-old Hispanic female with smoking and financial problems, hypothyroidism and high blood pressure. The case assessment enabled me to critically analyze the client’s intervention history against the current ones. Additionally, the learning product demonstrates how I was also able to effectively communicate with the client during the periodic monitoring of the client and was able to successfully provide moral support to the client as she moved towards achieving her goal.
While designing the group proposal, I was able to effectively distinguish, evaluate and integrate multiple sources of knowledge from various research sources to identify the unmet needs among the Latino young adult immigrant population. Identification of the unmet needs was integral to completing this assignment as it defined the purpose of the group. I also demonstrated effective written communication skills for working with groups while completing the assignment in different areas including how the group will be structured, its composition, behavioral pattern, recruitment criteria and how the guidelines for evaluating the group for effectiveness.
Competency 4: Engage diversity & difference in practice
In my individual and family assessment, I demonstrated knowledge and skills in building strong worker/client relationships, assessment of families and individuals and an understanding of the sociocultural and environmental influences of the two groups. Therefore, for my assessment, my focus was on assessing Antwone, a 20-year-old African American male individual who had been subjected to multiple forms of abuse while growing up in his family. The assessment made me recognize and effectively communicate the significance of differences in shaping the client’s life experiences. Additionally, completing this learning product enables me to understand the value of treating every case differently because Antwone’s case was unique with specific details that needed to be understood to effectively meet his needs.
NHEP, my agency of practicum placement is committed to equality and diversity efforts and has currently it's staff members it is highly rated for a staff with a high level of cultural competency. When preparing my agency assignment, I demonstrated my understanding of the importance of cultural competency for NHEP. Completing this assignment made me realize that agencies need to change their approach of service delivery from merely treating everybody the same to unique and quality service delivery for every client because every individual has different needs.
Competency 5: Advance human rights & social & economic justice
By completing the individual and family assessment paper, I was able to understand various forms of oppression particularly those against the client. As a child, the client assessed in the paper was not only subjected to physical and emotional abuse but also issues of diversity, ethnicity, and religion. The data I gathered from the client and his family was later used to assemble a list of client’s needs, short-term and long-term recommendations that he would benefit him. Through identifying the injustices that surrounded the client in his childhood to the present day and making recommendations, I advocated for practices that would promote diversity, equality, social and economic justice of other clients with similar situations as the client.
The professional paper demonstrated my knowledge towards delivering service to all regardless of social or economic status. This paper also shared advocacy efforts for an all-inclusive society including systems and dynamics from which one can only learn through training. I further emphasized on the need for maintaining equality and diversity in workplaces with the aim of providing the foundation for a similar kind of service delivery for the clients.
Competency 6: Engage in research- informed practice & practice- informed research
As part of designing a group proposal, I was involved in tremendous research to effectively determine the unmet needs of the young adults’ Latino group with the name Grupo Estabilidad. This research included assembling resources on the projections of what the Latino minority group will constitute in the coming six decades. This paper also enabled me to identify credible sources after that investigated the impact that the making legal changes to this minority group would have on their psychological well-being. Assembling the knowledge presented on the sources used required skills in an effective location, evaluation, retrieval and use of information resources. I gathered 15 sources but ended up using only two resources that I determined to be relevant, accurate, current and credible.
My individual and family assessment also required detailed research to inform the needs of the client. However, not all sources that I used in this assessment assignment were retrieved from existing literature on the subject because most sections of the assessment report were based on a six-hour interview between the client and myself as an intern. In fact, the data obtained from this interview was used in developing the assessment report as it consisted of exploratory questions and voluntary information as provided by the client. The assessment report can also be used in the future in understanding the details of similar cases to determine better approaches to helping individuals in a similar situation as Antwone.
Competency 7: Apply knowledge of human behavior & the social environment
While developing my SW Population and Professional paper, I applied knowledge and skills that implied my understanding of social work. This assignment made me appreciate the need of training and education for effective interactions with people or groups at different levels of the societ...