The Roles of a Social Worker

So the month of March is Social Work month so I thought that I should post something related to that. To be honest, I didn’t want to be a social worker growing up. I wanted to go to medical school and be an ER doctor. Unfortunately my high school education in the sciences was very skimpy. I took Algebra I and II and Biology. No chemistry whatsoever. Needless to say, I quickly realized after my first Biology class that I was missing a whole lot of the fundamentals. To be honest I had no idea what I wanted my major to be as I began to prepare to move away from home and start college. While I knew that I wanted to go to medical school, I knew that I didn’t want to major in the sciences. I remember standing in the registration line for college and when I got to the counter the registration lady asked what major I wanted to declare. For some reason the words “social work” came out my mouth and I just stuck with it. I did this with the understanding (at least in my head) that I would just take all the classes needed in order to ensure my admission into medical school. However I soon realized that without any reference point in the sciences, I would have a hard time taking the necessary classes and actually passing them. So I did what any person with common sense would do—quickly formulated a plan B. I decided that the social sciences were more suited for me and they held my interest. One of the things that I like about social work is that it’s very person centered and takes the individual, their background, and their environment into consideration. The field is so diverse and there are a lot of opportunities to make a difference in the lives of others. While I love the other social sciences, I’m appreciative of my social work education because it is fairly practice based and while there are mounds of paperwork, many times I get the chance to actually interact with people and implement interventions that improve their quality of life. 

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