My Career Path Of Working With Families As A Professional Social Worker

After completing this course, I am looking forward to starting my career path of working with families as a professional social worker. This career field looks like it will be both challenging and rewarding at the same time. I am hoping that my education at Appalachian State University will provide me with most of the skills and training that I will need in order to be an effective advocate and helper for my clients. My goal is to assist families in obtaining the resources that they need the most. I aspire to empower the families that I work with and aid them in discovering ways to manage their difficulties. I anticipate establishing relationships with them and encouraging their success by focusing on their strengths rather than their
shortfalls. I desire to help them better their lives and find suitable solutions to their problems. Overall, I feel that I am more prepared, and I am excited to be even closer to becoming a qualified social worker.
The course material and assignments have provided me with knowledge that will be a useful resource to help me in my future endeavors as a social worker. Dr. Howell’s lectures and the assigned readings gave me a better understanding of diverse families and culture. This material will be useful to me when I provide service to these populations as well as other vulnerable populations. I will be mindful and respectful of their differences when working with them. The lectures and readings also taught me the importance of working with these families to help them solve their problems rather than simply telling them what they need to do to fix everything.
I believe that my public speaking skills are a weakness in my skill set as a social worker and are definitely a work in progress.
Through the group presentations, I had another opportunity to practice developing these skills. I realize that I have a long way to go before I am truly proficient in this area. However, I am always happy to have the chance to practice using these skills in front of my classmates in order to make improvements. I hope to be more skillful in this area by graduation. I believe that the other presenting groups did an outstanding job of providing me with valuable information in regards to finding resources to meet the needs of families. I also gained a better knowledge and understanding of some of the challenges that families may face and how to assist them in overcoming these challenges. The issues of alcoholism, substance abuse, intimate partner violence, mental illness, and caring for older family members are very relevant in society today. I believe that I have more information on all of the issues and am hoping that I will be able to use the information to help my clients in the
future.
One of my favorite activities was working in small groups on the case studies. In these small group activities that we did in class, I learned how to better recognize and focus on the strengths of clients and how to find effective ways of meeting their needs. I also learned that I should not make impulsive decisions and that I must always have a non-judgmental attitude when working with clients. I should never jump to conclusions about a case. I must take my time and review every detail in order to ensure that I am not missing anything. By working in groups with my classmates, the activities gave me the chance to learn how to collaborate with others. I believe that this will be useful in the future when working with other social workers and supervisors on cases.
Even though my grade was undesirable, the bibliography was probably my favorite assignment. It presented me with the opportunity to do additional research on my areas of interest. I also found it fascinating that it was the first time that I had ever been able to do an assignment on my area of interest in social work. I enjoyed reading each and every article. In fact, I read many of them more than once. The assignment gave me additional insight and helped me better determine what career path I would like to take after graduation. The articles were also very informative. It was obvious that every article was carefully selected and relevant to a particular subject. The assignment was also well organized. I only wish that I could have done better.
The interview assignment provided me with the chance to pose questions to a professional social worker in the field.
I was able to find out firsthand about the training and skills that I would need in order to become a successful family social worker. I believe that it also allowed me another opportunity to establish a connection, which might provide useful when I am seeking employment after graduation. I also appreciated having a choice in this assignment because I was able to once again pursue my area of interest. The note of thanks was an excellent idea. We have participated in many related assignments in the past where we interviewed social workers in the field, and we never wrote a note of thanks. I am glad that we had the opportunity to do this and that we now know the importance of this gesture. I will be certain to include a note of thanks when interviewing professionals in future
classes.
Even though the course was an optional elective, I chose to register for it because I thought that it would be more beneficial to me as a social worker than the alternatives. I was certainly not disappointed. I enjoyed it even more than I expected. I believe that it is a very valuable class to all future social workers. Hopefully, most of us are now leaving the course with a better knowledge of how to work effectively with children and families. No matter what area of social work we choose to work in, it is likely that we will find ourselves working with families. It is important that we know how to work with these families in order to provide them with the best assistance possible.