Classes will start in January 2012
Next placement tests will be on:
Saturday, November 19 from 10:00am a 1:00pm
Saturday, December 3 from 10:00am a 1:00pm
For more information and to register for the placement test, please call
(773) 442-4080
Participants must be older than 18 years

The ASSW will be holding its bake sale on Thursday November 17, 2011 at the main campus from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. and at the El Centro campus from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. The bake sale at the main campus will be on the first floor of LWH.

Please come to support both the ASSW and its partner organization Sit-Stay-Read! A representative from Sit-Stay-Read will be at the bake sale to answer questions and provide more information about their organization.

Anyone who is interested in bringing a baked good can e-mail Joanna Leja/ASSW treasuer at J-leja@neiu.edu .

Lets make this the best ASSW bake sale yet!

THE NEIU SOCIAL WORK PROGRAM PROUDLY PRESENTS A FUNDRAISER WITH ALL PROCEEDS BENEFITING THE CONSUELO GROUP, A PROGRAM
AT ENLACE CHICAGO FOR PARENTS WHO LOST A CHILD TO VIOLENCE.

DONATIONS WILL BE COLLECTED FOR THE CONSUELO GROUP AT ENLACE CHICAGO IN CONJUNCTION WITH A SCREENING OF THE CRITICALLY
ACCLAIMED DOCUMENTARY

“THE INTERRUPTERS”

GENEROUSLY HOSTED BY
NORTHEASTERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY

AFTER THE FILM THERE WILL BE A PANEL DISCUSSION FEATURING EDDIE BOCANEGRA, NEIU SOCIAL WORK STUDENT AND LEAD FEATURE IN THE
FILM. IN ADDITION, ACCLAIMED AUTHOR AND PRODUCER OF THE FILM ALEX KOTLOWITZ AND DIRECTOR STEVE JAMES (ALSO DIRECTOR OF
“HOOP DREAMS”) WILL FIELD QUESTIONS MODERATED BY SOCIAL WORK PROFESSORS JADE STANLEY AND FRANCISCO GAYTAN.
GO TO THE SOCIAL WORK OFFICE (LECH WALESA HALL 3077) TO DROP OFF YOUR SIX-DOLLAR DONATION TO ENLACE CHICAGO IN SUPPORT OF THE CONSUELO GROUP
AND PICK UP A PASS TO RESERVE A SEAT FOR THE SCREENING.
LIMIT TWO PASSES PER NEIU ID WHILE THEY ARE AVAILABLE.
SUGGESTED DONATION FOR THE CONSUELO GROUP AT ENLACE CHICAGO ON THE DAY OF THE SCREENING FOR ANY REMAINING PASSES WILL
BE TEN DOLLARS.
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2011
3 P.M. FILM SCREENING IN THE AUDITORIUM
6 P.M. PANEL DISCUSSION IN ALUMNI HALL (REFRESHMENTS WILL BE SERVED)

NEIU social work student Eddie Bocanegra recently has walked down the red carpet and continues to appear in the media about his role in the documentary “The Interrupters.” Produced/directed by Steve James (Hoop Dreams) and author Alex Kotlowitz, “The Interrupters” features Eddie Bocanegra and two other “violence interrupters” who patrol some of Chicago’s roughest streets and try to diffuse the violence that has become too common.

 

To view the trailer, visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wS5Hjhy1RhM  For information, visit http://interrupters.kartemquin.com/.

 

To see recent media coverage about the film and Eddie’s role, see:

 

WTTW-TV’s “Chicago Tonight”

http://www.wttw.com/chicagotonight/video/gxim0E8tYeNEj_7zBvIhbJRmOO8lFOjl/

 

National Public Radio broadcast on WBEZ-FM

http://www.wbez.org/story/2011-06-29/interrupters-take-chicagos-youth-violence-88559

 

The New York Times

http://movies.nytimes.com/2011/07/29/movies/the-interrupters-a-documentary-by-steve-james-review.html

 

Chicago Sun-Times

http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/movies/6993884-421/interrupters-work-to-stop-violence-before-it-gets-started.html

 

Chicago Tribune

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/movies/ct-mov-0812-premier-attraction-20110812,0,6991594.column

 

Reuters

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/sns-rt-us-interrupterstre77a5kj-20110811,0,2037495.story

Despite the current state of foreign affairs at the forefront of most American minds, the status of returning Veterans who served abroad often goes unacknowledged. The Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) extends itself beyond simple awareness. This non-for-profit organization provides financial support for physically and psychologically wounded veterans returning from overseas. Drawing inspiration from the “communities” portion of Professor Gaytan’s HBSE II course, the 2012 daytime Social Work cohort decided to team up and devote energy to this cause. Our cohort has been actively raising money to donate to the WWP. On May 1^st we will run/walk the NEIU Golden Eagle 5K to raise awareness of the Wounded Warrior Project and their mission. Our cohort anticipates the opportunity to offer the WWP the sum of donations collected. Thus far, we have reached $445 in online donations alone.

Working on this project holds strong social work implications for us aspiring and anxious to be in the field. For some, the project is more personal. Marlene Julye, veteran and social work student, said, “I feel that veterans… many of them are forgotten.” Julye served in the military from May 2004 to November 2008 and took responsibility to organize her classmates. Julye originally planned on running for this cause before she brought the idea to her cohort’s attention. “Having the class involved is more than I could have done by myself,” she said. Each student took responsibility for a job to contribute, ranging from contacting the news and the WWP, setting up Facebook pages, and even creating tee shirts. Juyle recognizes the strong impact the WWP has for veterans, some of whom she knows personally. Julye said that the WWP helps veterans feel as though they are still part of a team while transitioning back into civilian life. In general, this project represents why we want to be in social work: devoting ourselves to a cause that matters to strangers, to our peers and to ourselves.

-Megan Ponte

Social Work Month is upon us. Given that NEIU Social Work marches to the beat of its own drummer, we will do most of our celebrating next month (in April), even though the official NASW Social Work Month is this month (March).

NEIU Social Work’s celebration Kick-off is this Wednesday at El Centro. The Master of Ceremonies will be Miguel Cambray, the director of the Latino Cultural Resource Center. We will be treated to insights from alumni from our social work program about post-graduate life.

March 30th- 7pm Alumni Panel at El Centro

Our main event will take place on April 8th from 9am-9pm in Alumni Hall.

There will be all day workshops on social work practice and application of our values/skills/techniques.

SPECIAL INVITATION TO SENIORS FOR A WRITING WORKSHOP FROM 5:30pm-7pm IN  ALUMNI HALL

The culminating highlight of the day will be:

A POT LUCK DINNER in the P.E. COMPLEX  from 5:50pm-7pm

PLEASE BRING SOMETHING TO SHARE!
MUSIC AND DANCING FROM   7pm-9pm

The social work program had a great outing to see the controversial film, “Waiting for Superman” on Sunday. Over 25 students and faculty attended and engaged in a lively conversation over dinner afterward. Conversations have continued on campus regarding this film. The film was so thought-provoking that instructor Marius Dancea has decided to take his entire research class to see the film.

So what is all the hype about? The film, through the personal stories of five children trying to gain admittance to charter schools, highlights the difficulties that public schools have had educating children in the U.S. We learn from the film that the United States ranks low among industrialized nations in terms of its test scores, with only a minority of students scoring at the highest levels of proficiency. We also learn that teachers’ unions sometimes make it difficult to hold teachers accountable for their classroom performance; we are told that this is important because teacher quality is the largest in-school factor determining student academic outcomes. We see that hundreds of families have tried to flee the traditional public schools to charter school, which often do not have to follow the rules of unions and the school districts, yet are still publicly funded. By removing some of the union and district restrictions, the movie argues that charter schools are able to better educate students by hiring and keeping only the best teachers and by instituting innovative yet common sense practices, such as a longer school day for students in areas where they behind academically, or by eliminating tracking, or in the most extreme cases, by providing a boarding school. We finally see that these innovative practices are only offered to a few students, thus leaving many people behind to languish in the public school system, which as the film presents, is failing horribly. Seeing some of the failures of public schools surely creates ire to those who have seen it, which is likely the reason for the strong feelings.

Some have argued that the film presents quite a biased story however. Diane Ravitch, an educational researcher at New York University and a one-time advocate of charter schools, has noted that the film leaves out quite a bit. For example, the film glosses over the fact that only 17% of charter schools are actually better than the local public schools they compete with. Thirty-seven percent are actually worse! Yet, the film provides these schools as a panacea for social ills. Richard Rothstein, an economist and educational researcher at Columbia University in New York notes that many of the issues that face public school students have nothing to do with the schools, but rather poverty, parental education, and racial inequalities. While the film notes that the largest in-school factor affecting student success is teacher quality, it fails to mention that researchers have found that over 60% of what predicts a student’s success occurs OUTSIDE of school. He also notes that the Harvard educated Geoffrey Canada is held up as a hero for what he has done in his charter schools in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City; what the film does not note is that he supports his students not only in the school, but also with 200 MILLION dollars worth of private donations to fund health and dental care, parenting classes, and other social services, all things that surely affect his outcomes just as much, if not more than the teachers in the classroom. Finally, Gail Collins of the New York Times notes that public schools are about the public good. Also, the NINETY PERCENT of Americans attend public schools and the majority of college graduates also had a public K-12 education. If they are failing so horribly how are we able to function as a society? The schools are not as bad as this alarmist movie argues, she contends. What Collins claims is truly lamentable is the way we subject poor minority families to the public humiliation of a lottery that the odds dictate that they are likely to lose. Why do we choose this cutthroat method rather than just providing a good public education (and health care, and jobs, and safe neighborhoods with services) for all Americans?

As the semester progresses some students are coming upon the time when they must take tests and quizzes in their courses. Tests are often a source of great anxiety as they test what you know, but are often used to tell us who we are. The distinction is important because simply knowing or not knowing the definition to a word or the correct equation to use in a math problem does not need to be a measure of self-worth, but simply a way to see whether one has learned some specified body of knowledge or not.  In today’s era of high-stakes testing, however, we are using tests to measure the worthiness of some individuals and schools to receive resources or not.  The ability to do well or not on a test becomes more than a way to assess knowledge, but rather a way to sort people and potentially reinforce pre-existing inequalities. In social work, a field that is very sensitive to oppression, discrimination, and injustice, we are loath to accept methods that may perpetuate social ills. Students sometimes knowingly choose social work for this reason; they may think that it is an easy field, bound by intellectual relativism, where there are no right or wrong answers in the world. If there are not right or wrong answers, how can you have a valid test? If there are no valid tests, then social work majors shouldn’t have to take them, the argument goes (the fact that there won’t be any tests seems like a really great reason to choose this major!). Does that mean that tests should be abandoned entirely? Or, is there a place for assessing skills and knowledge in a way that can help us learn and become better at what we do? That is the question that two recent New York Times articles sought to explore (the first article is here and the second is here). While they are seemingly opposed, they really argue the same point: that a test should or should not be used based upon its utility for teaching and learning. There is a body of knowledge in social work that needs to be learned by social work students and there should be ways to assess whether you have learned that knowledge or not; so don’t throw out the test with the bath water-study hard and do your best, and if you don’t get the grade you want, it doesn’t make you a bad person-it only tells you what other information you might still need to learn. What are your thoughts? Should social work students be tested on their knowledge of social work terms, values, critical thinking and skills, or is this something that we can never really measure, meaning we should be test-free in social work?