MANDEL SCHOOL
NEWS AND EVENTS
February 09, 2011
MSASS Offers Guaranteed Paid Placement in Field Agencies
MSASS is the only social work school in the country that guarantees a stipend for field placement work. Students at the Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences provide some 225,000 hours of community service for approximately 350 community agencies. This service enabled the social work school to become eligible for increased work-study funding from the federal government through special funding.
Field placements are a requirement for social work students enrolled in the master's program.
Mandel School Dean Grover C. Gilmore said full-time students in their first and second years have a guaranteed stipend of around $6,000.
According to Karen Powers, MSASS associate dean for financial aid, the school recently received $172,837 in additional stimulus funds to support the field placement experiences.
"This is not the largest stipend we have given students, but it is among the largest amount awarded," she said. The stipend can vary from year to year depending upon the amount of work-study funding received.
Gilmore said Case Western Reserve is the only social work school in the country that provides and guarantees a stipend for field placement work. Because of this support and experience with community organizations, it is one of the reasons many students come to the social work school for their professional education.
He adds that this stipend is given by the school, and thus frees the budgets of social agencies to use their funds for direct services to their clients.
In the first semester of the master's program, all students work 16 hours each week. From the second semester of the first year through the end of the second year, students work 24 hours in an agency—usually linked to a social work area of interest to the student.