Description of Practicum in EMU Social Work Program

Owned by Laura Lehman (Deactivated)
Last updated: Mar 18, 2021 by Carol Hurst
4 min read


The Social Work department at Eastern Mennonite University offers a Bachelor of Arts degree in social work. The social work program, accredited by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE), is designed to prepare baccalaureate students for beginning generalist professional social work practice and for entry into graduate social work education.

A. Community Learning & Engagement

Before students get to the senior practicum placement, our social work classes require them to volunteer in the community and to engage in community events that build awareness of the agencies and services in the Harrisonburg community. Community Service and Engagement are viewed as vital parts of professional social work education. These field experiences are meant to provide students with firsthand exposure and experience to "learning by observation and doing." Students become more familiar with the needs of individual systems, family systems, and community level systems, and what is involved in structured helping of others. They witness types of services provided, and how programs and agencies work.
Community Learning is a component of Exploring Social Work (SOWK 101) and community engagement part of Social Work Practice II (SOWK 400), Social Policy Analysis (SOWK 330), and Social Work Practice III (SOWK 410). Community service and engagement involve commitment and follow-through that students must demonstrate in order to receive course credit.
A significant expectation is for students to view real service and social work helping in action, and to see how different organizations structure the formal helping process for clients within community systems. These experiences give them opportunity to reflect on the purpose of the social work profession. They can engage how the core values (Service, Social Justice, Dignity and worth of the person, Importance of human relationships, Integrity, & Competence) of the NASW Code of Ethics provide a professional frame for social work helping. They can critically scrutinize their own suitability for the social work profession.
Community learning and engagement requirements in our curriculum prompt student reflection on his/her motives and personal fit with the values and mission of the social work profession.

B. Senior Practicum and Seminar

The senior practicum is a 430-clock-hour, 14 or 15-week placement (depending how fast the student logs necessary hours), which is completed during the first or second semester of the senior year, or during the summer, providing satisfactory supervisory arrangements can be made. Students must have satisfactorily completed all other required social work courses in the curriculum before beginning the senior practicum in social work.


EMU's Field Coordinator/Liaison facilitates the student's selection of the practicum agency in the semester prior to the student's placement. The program maintains information on appropriate field placement opportunities. The student-agency match is based on student preference, educational/professional needs, and organizational availability and willingness to work with a particular student. The program maintains regular contact with the agency during the student's placement.
The practicum is designed to provide students with opportunities to integrate and apply academic knowledge and theory to actual social work situations. Under close supervision of the Field Instructor, it is expected that the student performs social work roles and responsibilities similar to those of a new staff member in the agency. Students are expected to demonstrate personal and professional growth, reflect on, analyze, and exhibit social work values, engage in beginning social work helping relationships with clients,  and apply generalist social work knowledge, values and skills.

Senior Practicum Formal Assessment Process

  1. Completion of the Mid/Final-Semester Field Instruction Outcome Assessment of the student's professional social work performance. The purpose of the evaluation is to identify the extent to which the Student Practicum Goals and Objectives have been achieved.
  2. Administration of the oral final exam, taken late in the student's final semester. The questions focus on integration of social work knowledge and practice. The oral is designed to evaluate the student's understanding and comprehension of professional social work practice, the helping process, theoretical grounding, and to assess the student's personal and professional growth process during the practicum. The questions for the Oral Final Exam are in the Field Instruction Manual (p ).

Senior Practicum Seminar

The Senior Practicum Seminar is a weekly 2-hour class on campus that students are required to attend as a part of the senior practicum. The seminar's purpose is to provide students with an opportunity to share their experiences and, in so doing, enrich the practice knowledge of the other students concurrently enrolled in practicum in the same cohort. The seminar gives students an opportunity to enhance their professional self-development; to apply ethical social work standards to real client and practice situations; to discuss how to apply generalist professional social work knowledge, values and skills to the specific practice situations. And to deepen understanding according to the core competency practice behaviors as students are engaged in practicum activities.
The Senior Practicum Seminar activities include:

  1. Submission of a Learning contract, weekly journals, and beginning and middle report.
  2. The student presents a powerpoint slide presentation about the placement organization in practicum seminar class. The presentation should describe the organization, its mission, organizational culture, leadership & niche in the service community.
  3. During placements, students participate in a supportive peer group with the cohort of students in placement. The group is facilitated by the professor teaching the seminar class.
  4. Professional application assignments include:
    1. completion of two process recordings of client and/or group interactions,
    2. completion of a bio, psycho, social, spiritual assessment based on a client (with identifying details altered).
  5. Seminar class also uses questions from the Pathway to Licensure program. These are questions from prior ASWB (Association of Social Work Boards) BSW level licensure exams. The questions are used to process the typical steps that social workers take in practice situations.
  6. Students take a final oral exam with social work faculty at the end of the placement.  The oral exam provides an opportunity to articulate their experiences of implementing behaviors according to each competency.


These activities facilitate student efforts to integrate social work knowledge with specific practice situations.