National Association of Social Workers

Social Work Congress Sets Future Course

Social workers gather for a discussion and celebration of the profession.

By Sheryl Fred, News Staff

Facilitators take detailed notes on Congress proceedings.

More than 400 social work leaders came together in Washington, D.C., March 16-18 for Social Work Congress 2005 and adopted 12 "imperatives" for the profession's future.

Co-conveners for the Congress included NASW, the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, the Council on Social Work Education and the National Association of Deans and Directors of Schools of Social Work. AARP, the Association of Oncology Social Work, the Group for the Advancement of Doctoral Education, the Institute for the Advancement of Social Work Research, the NASW Legal Defense Fund, the NASW Insurance Trust, the New York Academy of Medicine and the Simmons College School of Social Work served as co-sponsors.

The Congress featured presentations and workshops addressing the future of social work and an energetic discussion of what the profession's imperatives should be for the next decade.

"For the first time in a long time, we brought the profession together to look not just at social issues, but at the profession itself," said NASW Executive Director Elizabeth J. Clark.

Jean Quam of the National Association of Deans and Directors said the Congress "exceeded my expectations. One of the best things was that it brought a lot of people from different social work organizations together. I think being able to listen in smaller groups about what is important to each other and the future of social work was very helpful."

Anita Curry-Jackson, president of the Association of Baccalaureate Social Work Program Directors, said she felt the Congress "was one of the few efforts made to really try to bring a cross-section of persons in the social work field together to talk about a common agenda, as well as look at where we need to be in the future."

A vision for the profession. NASW President Gary Bailey officially kicked off the Congress with a discussion of a collective vision for the profession. He read a vision statement that the leadership of the convening organizations had developed: "Social work expertise is highly valued for helping the global community protect and advance the well-being of all people, at every stage of life."

Bailey then asked participants how this vision relates to other perspectives on the future of social work, and turned the discussion over to Robert Mittman, an independent facilitator who helped guide the Congress agenda.

The first general session ended with a keynote address from award-winning journalist and author Anna Quindlen. She used her experiences as a mother to talk about the importance of social workers linking policy with practice and touched on some of the pressures and contradictions women, in particular, face in the United States.

"This is the only country in the world where a rich mother is a bad mother for going back to work and a poor mother is a bad mother for staying at home," she said.

Quindlen also took issue with some of the hypocrisies that politicians tend to perpetuate.

"The elderly are the repository of wisdom — until they want health care," she said. "Immigrants are the backbone of this country — until they want jobs."

During the question and answer period, Quindlen said social work must find ways to make people understand what social work is and why it's important.

"I have never heard a high school student say, 'I want to be a social worker,'" she said. "Too many people in America don't know what you do."

The second general session focused on some of the key challenges and opportunities for the profession currently and in the future. Tracy Whitaker, associate director of NASW's Center for Workforce Studies, presented preliminary findings from "Assuring the Sufficiency of a Frontline Workforce: A National Study of Licensed Social Workers," a survey of the profession as it now stands. [See "Center's Study Sees Labor Force Shortage Looming," this issue.] With Mittman's help, Congress participants brainstormed about which opportunities the profession would need to take advantage of in order to achieve the co-conveners' vision.

Then they split up and went to one of four breakout sessions: Aging, Health & Health Disparities, Behavioral Health or Children and Families. Participants in each section worked together to identify actions that would help the profession overcome challenges in their respective issue areas and recommend candidate imperatives for voting the following day.

Imperatives for the future. The second day of the Congress began with four more breakout sessions, this time in the areas of Education, Research, Practice or Policy. Again, participants discussed potential imperatives for the future.

Future social work leaders discuss profession's future and the imperatives.

That afternoon, all Congress attendees gathered for a general session featuring perspectives on the profession and the imperatives discussion from three future leaders of social work. Members of the panel included Dawn Hobdy, manager of NASW's Office of Ethics and Professional Review; Lakitia Mayo, director of grassroots advocacy and affiliate affairs for the American Public Health Association; and Patricia Welch Saleeby, visiting assistant professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis School of Social Welfare.

All panelists said they were pleased to hear social workers talking about social workers and the future of the profession.

"When I read the vision statement, it says, 'Protect the well-being of all people' — and that includes social workers," Saleeby said. "We need to protect the well-being of ourselves. Our mantra should be 'No Social Worker Left Behind.'"

Mayo discussed the value in the profession changing the way it presents itself to the government and the business community and emphasized the power of organizing as a means of achieving this goal.

"[Social workers in community organizing] are really important to moving our message forward," she said.

Hobdy called for continued commitment to the profession's imperatives.

"After this weekend, I have an incredible new pride in my profession," she said. "I want to make sure we put all the work we've done this week into action."

Participants vote electronically on the imperatives.

In the final general session, Congress participants voted electronically for the top imperatives. When all votes were in, Mittman displayed the top 12 vote-getters.

After the imperatives were adopted, Bailey introduced NASW President-Elect Elvira Craig de Silva, and leaders of the co-convening organizations made closing remarks.

"The next step is going to be very crucial in terms of how strategies are defined and how we work to accomplish the imperatives [set at the Congress]," Quam said later.

Curry-Jackson said the ambition of the Congress was daunting, but the process "allowed for hundreds of people to help shape these imperatives. What's before us now is what we do next, and how we collectively move forward."

"NASW is the largest social work organization in the country," Clark said, "but we're much stronger when we work together with sister organizations to identify a shared agenda."

From May 2005 NASW News. © 2005 National Association of Social Workers. All Rights Reserved. NASW News articles may be copied for personal use, but proper notice of copyright and credit to the NASW News must appear on all copies made. This permission does not apply to reproduction for advertising, promotion, resale, or other commercial purposes.