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Welcome.

This video will address the spectrum of social work

practice, from micro social work, which

is working with individuals, to mezzo social work,

working with families or working with small groups,

to macro social work, the actual focus of this course,

working with agencies, organizations, communities,

and large groups of people.

To begin, a competent social worker

needs to understand the entire spectrum of social work

activity to be effective in any one segment of social work

practice.

That is, social workers need to understand

the interconnectedness of micro social work, mezzo social work,

and macro social work.

In actual practice, most social workers

find themselves working across the spectrum of the field,

without being confined just to one aspect of social work

activity.

Just let's take a look at an example.

Assume that you are a school social worker.

You've been assigned to provide counseling services

to a third-grader in the school.

Now, this would be an excellent example of micro social work

practice.

It's counseling.

In this case, the child was referred to you by the teacher.

The presenting problems include a sullen and uncooperative

attitude, fighting with peers on the playground, failing grades.

You review the child's records and you determine

that he was a good student last year,

and the problems presenting now appear to be new.

After meeting with the child, you

conclude that he seems to be reacting to something going on

in the home.

So you arrange a meeting with the parents

to determine what's going on at home,

an excellent example of mezzo social work practice,

with families.

The parents appear to be loving, caring people who are concerned

about their child.

However, they acknowledge that they're

under a great deal of stress.

Father recently lost his job.

Unemployment benefits plus income

from Mother's part-time job is insufficient to meet

the family of five's needs.

They're falling behind in the rent.

They're struggling economically.

The price of gas is making it difficult for Father

to get around to look for work.

They fear becoming homeless.

You attempt to make referrals for the father

to sources of employment.

Again, now we've shifted back to micro social work

services, case management.

What you find is that the entire community

in which your clients live has been hit hard

by the recent economic recession.

Job training and placement agencies

are not taking new applications, because there are no jobs.

You check with city resources and you

find that the bad news is that funding

for local transportation services

has been cut, reducing the number of buses and trains

available to community residents.

Low-income housing is a top priority for the city,

but at this time, thousands of persons

are living on the street, with no real solution

to this issue on the horizon.

Job resources are meager, and those that are available

include educational and experience requirements

that are well above those of the family you're working with.

While working on this case, you learn on the news

that the state is having a budget problem

and will be cutting basic funding that

supports local transportation, medical care, and job

development for low-income families.

This reduction in funding will result in fewer dollars

to the city, which will in turn impact

the resources available in the local communities.

The target of most of the cuts is low-income and poor people

within the state.

You respond to a call from the NASW state chapter

to petition your state to avoid the harsh cuts for the poor

that are being debated in the state legislature.

Now we're looking at macro social work.

This is advocacy for clientele.

You know from the daily news that the national economy

is struggling to recover from a severe recession,

resulting in reorganization and redistribution

of federal resources that will reduce support to the states

in providing services to low-income

and working poor families.

Homelessness and hunger, identified national concerns

which are the threats to the child in your school,

is not being addressed with sufficient strength

to meet the national need.

Proposed legislation that would begin to address the problem

is unlikely to pass because of the cost involved.

You write to your two US senators, urging passage

of legislation that will assist the members of your community

struggling to find work and to locate reasonable housing.

Again, an example of macro social work-- advocacy.

From local and national news and information

from your local professional organization,

you know that one of the issues resulting in unemployment

of the father of your client is outsourcing

of jobs in the United States to other countries.

The global economy, as it has emerged over the past 20 years,

is stripping the country of the range of jobs, particularly

those at the low end of the job market, that were at one time

available within local communities.

And there appear to be few employment replacement

opportunities being developed.

Social workers involved in policy development--

an example of social work macro practice--

are needed to address basic issues of employment that

affect the country all the way down to the community, family,

and child level, as demonstrated by the child

with whom you're working in your school.

Regardless of their focus of practice along the social work

spectrum, effective social workers

understand that the interconnectedness

of micro to macro social work forms the heart of social work

practice.