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CHHS >> Social Work >> SSW About Us

 

School of Social Work

 

Quick Notes

Degrees Offered:

BASW, MSW

Accreditation

Council on Social Work Education

Student Faculty Ratio

 

Mission Statement

The mission of the School of Social Work is to provide educational opportunities that promote a just and secure society. To this end, we are committed to, and base our program on, the principle that social work should:

• Create a physical environment that sustains all life forms Meet our basic survival needs for food, clothing, shelter, and livelihood
• Respect our fundamental dignity and personal and cultural identities
• Protect all people from avoidable harm

We honor human diversity and acknowledge its vital role in advancing mutuality and interdependence. Our aim is to educate social work practitioners who will be versatile, creative, and effective in serving the peoples of the San Francisco Bay Area in context of global economic and human relations. Our goal is to address the needs of the oppressed, disenfranchised, and otherwise marginalized peoples and communities.

Our teaching incorporates a comprehensive range of knowledge, values, skills, and experiences for social work practice at all levels of intervention. The outcome is to provide learning experiences that will instill critical consciousness and inspire students to become advocates for economic and social justice.

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 School Philosophy

The School of Social Work at San Francisco State University is located in an environment which is unique for its concentration of disadvantaged and vulnerable populations: racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants and refugees, gays and lesbians, single parents, children, disabled and the aged. The presence in large numbers of any one of these populations at risk in a metropolitan area would be noteworthy enough alone. However, it is the concentration of a constellation of such populations that makes the San Francisco Bay Area unique. This diversity presents both a challenge and an opportunity to the School of Social Work.

Each of these groups represents a population that is neglected, underserved and oppressed. Each has been systematically denied or bared access to resources available to the general population. Each has been denied an equitable share of society's rights, benefits, privileges and opportunities. The aspirations of these groups to realize their full human potential have been frustrated by an indifferent and frequently hostile society.

While the School of Social Work seeks to be responsive to the needs of the general community, we believe that we have a special mission to respond to the needs and aspirations of these particular populations at risk in the San Francisco Bay Area. Therefore, we aim to produce social work practitioners who will staff programs concerned with the identification and solution of problems that particularly affect these populations such as institutionalized racism, sexism and homophobia, poverty and unemployment, substandard housing, inferior education, inadequate health care, insufficient child care, social isolation, bureaucratic neglect, and public indifference.

We expect our graduates to strive to increase the accessibility of services for these populations, to organize them into effective advocacy groups, to assist them in their own program development, and ultimately, to enable them to acquire and exercise power on their own behalf. At the same time, our graduate's work within established human service agencies and institutions to secure greater responsiveness and accountability to the people they serve.

Thus, our program aims to educate social workers who will render direct services to people in need and assist communities in their struggle for self-determination and empowerment.

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