Search

In a field practicum based in a low-income community, social work students' sense of empowerment depended on the kind of feedback they received from others. The critical source of feedback was the field instructor. A field setting with limited structural supports is liberating to most students but overwhelming for some. (Author/MSE)

The article presents a comment on the article "Advocacy and Professional Ethics," by N. Gilbert and H. Specht, published in the July 1976 issue of the Journal "Social Work." The author believes that Gilbert and Specht have added some useful insights to the continuing consideration of advocacy in social work. They have also helped to rescue advocacy from obscurity in a period when many social workers are running for cover. The author does not agree with their view that the Ad Hoc Committee was merely symbolically reaffirming ethical practice when it rooted advocacy in the first principle of the Code of Ethics. The author believes that Gilbert and Specht have made some excellent points regarding the ambiguity of the committee's position and how this could become distorted in practice. The committee posed the problem in which the designated client is competing with other needy individuals for the same scarce resource, and it asserted that the relative claims of the two should be weighed. Gilbert and Specht pushed the issue to absurd lengths when they said one could be forced to survey the needs of all persons for a benefit before providing it for any client. This was obviously not the committee's intent.

No abstract available for this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

No abstract available for this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

No abstract available for this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

No abstract available for this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the potential transferability to other locales of a service integration design which was the basis of a five-year demonstration project in two Pennsylvania counties. The project came about as a result of circumstances which are unlikely to coincide in the future, and the design itself was loosely conceived and abandoned in certain key respects. Yet certain features of the project yielded positive results. The administrative leadership was able to overcome initially strong hostility in the two-county area and survive external threats to the project, but in so doing it was forced to trade off some key elements in the design. The delivery of services, primarily through five multiservice centers, resulted in greater utilization, more responsiveness to consumer needs, and some apparent success in outcomes. The project also brought about changes in staff orientation. Less successful were attempts to create innovative worker roles and mount a consumer advocacy program. Factors underlying the project's successes and failures are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

No abstract available for this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Presents several letters to the editor on issues related to social services. Challenges and opportunities offered by social work profession; Information about two books on child welfare; Issues related to medical care of ex-patients of mental hospital.

A letter to the editor is presented in response to an article about the case for a close alliance between social workers and the civil defense program, which was published in the July 1957 issue.