Council on Social Work Education

SOCW 6520 WK 4 responses 

Respond to the blog post of three colleagues Has to be responded to separately and different responses in one or more of the following ways: Name first and references after every person

• Validate      an idea in your colleague’s post with your own experience.
• Share      an insight from having read your colleague’s posting.

Peer 1:

Sasha Ritchie – 

Field Instructors play a significant role in social work education since field education is considered the profession’s signature pedagogy (Bogo, 2015; Council on Social Work Education, 2008; Kanno & Koeske, 2010, cited in Cooper-Bolinskey & Ketner, 2016)). It is normal for students to have anxiety, low-confidence, and have uncertainty in fieldwork decision-making. The supervisor plays a critical role in the integration of learning and professional practice for students. According to Ketner et. al (2017) to strengthen the supervisory model, field directors must take, and be given, the lead in adopting and operationalizing field education as their signature pedagogy, including field instruction while students are engaging in field education. Social work field instruction, or supervision, has taken many forms over the years. Contemporarily, Marc, Makai-Dimeny and Oşvat (2014) referred to supervision as an interactional process in which a qualified supervisor is assigned or designated to assist and direct the practice of supervisees in defined learning or practice areas.

Social work leadership is most closely aligned with the model of transformational leadership, a style in which the leader identifies the needed change creates the vision for that change, inspires and guides others to work toward that change, and executes the change as a team (Corbett & Clark, n.d.). My field instructor’s leadership style is democratic leadership. Northouse (2021) explains that democratic leadership is shared leadership. My supervisors’ type of leadership style allows me to take a more participative role in the decision-making process. Though my supervisor does not have to meet with me every time when I complete my hours, he still arranges for us to speak at the end of the day when I am working for Infinity Hospice. We meet virtually to discuss our cases and problem-solving and concerns that may have arisen during my workday. Democratic leaders often provide more opportunities to participate, ideas are exchanged freely, and discussion is encouraged. While the democratic process tends to focus on group equality and the free flow of ideas, the leader of the group is still there to offer guidance and control (p. 55-77).