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Field education is a vital part of learning and training for students pursuing an MSW degree. Guided by competencies created by the Council on Social Work Education, MSW programs are continuously evaluating the effectiveness of field experiences. U.S.-based public schools lack the training and capacity to provide adequate support to military-connected students. To understand the skills and competencies of MSW students placed in militaryconnected schools, the authors collected data from 30 first-year MSW students and their eight field instructors at two time points (fall and spring) during the 2010-2011 academic year. Both students and instructors gave higher-than-midpoint ratings to students on competencies at both time points. At time 1, students rated themselves lowest on application of complex practice models, policy issues, and working on the macro level with military organizations, whereas instructors rated students lowest on items related to systemic monitoring and research in practice. Progress toward competencies during the academic year was noted for more than half of the competencies. Although as groups, students and field instructors provided similar assessments, similarity within student-instructor dyads was low, suggesting opportunities for growth in the context of field instruction and the need for development of individual student-instructor relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research series replicated and extended earlier findings of Gardikiotis, Martin, and Hewstone (2004), who examined via content analysis UK media representations of numeric majority and minority groups. Using news articles from North and South Dakota, where majority/minority population characteristics mirror those of the UK in terms of number and power, Study 1 replicated the patterns of results found in Gardikiotis et al. Study 2, in which articles from California newspapers were analyzed, yielded findings contrary to Gardikiotis et al. and our Dakota analyses: Minority headlines were more frequent in California, and majority articles were longer than minority articles. Consistent with UK and Dakotas findings, majority headlines in California were associated with politics and identity adjectives, whereas minority headlines were linked to social issues and ethnicity-based adjectives. Arguably, these differences occurred because in California, unlike the UK and the Dakotas, Whites are not simultaneously the social power and the numeric majority. Variations in power and number associated with majority and minority status were discussed in explaining differences across contexts, and in signaling possible shortcomings in the conceptualization and methods used to investigate minority and majority influence. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The present study compares the effectiveness of a standardized peer-to-peer role play (RP) and a virtual client-trainer (VC-T) in training graduate-level students in the development of interviewing and clinical skills related to working with the military population. The study examines each training modality in six areas: (a) self-efficacy, (b) initial engagement, (c) recognizing and responding to symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder, (d) recognizing and responding to symptoms of suicide, (e) military cultural competence, and (f) overall competence., Method: A quasi-experimental nonequivalent groups study design was used. The sample comprised students enrolled in a graduate-level program (RP = 61; VC-T = 75). Participants completed pretest measures, attended training, and completed posttest measures., Results: Broadly, the findings revealed that RP and the VC-T are equally effective in increasing trainees' self-efficacy, recognition and response to posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, recognition and response to suicide symptoms, military cultural competence, and overall competence. These results suggest that regardless of training modality, trainees demonstrated increased clinical skills and competencies needed for working with the military population., Conclusions: The results suggest that both RP and the VC-T are equally effective, which opens the possibilities of implementing the VC-T as a training tool that has greater reach compared with RP. As more graduate programs offer an online version of their traditional on-ground coursework, the VC-T is an opportunity to have 1 training platform for both on-ground and online students. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).