Syllabus

Master of Social Work

SSWO 673 – Social Work and the Law (Fall 2021)

Credits - 3

Description

This course, “Social Work Practice and the Law” is designed to introduce students to the various components of law and how the exchanges between legal professionals and a social worker coincides when an individual, family, or group is faced with legal issues. It provides an introductory examination of historical frameworks of both law/social work and how the two systems interact with one another within all of the legal and social work domains. This course showcases the systems perspective as well as practice techniques in communicating and collaborating across professional fields. The goal of this course is to understand the context of law, social work, and their continuing relevance to understanding and meeting a client’s legal needs.

Materials

Learning Objectives and Outcomes

School of Social Work Program Outcomes:

Graduates of the UNE SSWO will demonstrate knowledge, skills, and leadership in the following:

1. Practice social inclusion to enable people, populations, and communities to fully participate in society, enhance human bonds in the context of cultural diversity and ensure improved quality of life and equitable resource distribution. EPAS Competencies 2 & 3
2. Engage in culturally-informed relationship building, being respectful of the complexity and diversity of contexts and circumstances. EPAS Competencies 3 & 6
3. Utilize theories of human behavior, social systems and social inclusion when offering interventions with people and their environments. EPAS Competency 8
4. Promote ethical reflection, critical consciousness and shared decision-making based in social work values and with consideration of the broader contexts of the world in which we live. EPAS Competency 1
5. Balance the roles of helpers, activists, and advocates through collaboration with communities to build healthy and sustainable resources. EPAS Competencies 2, 5, & 6
6. Engage as critical consumers and producers of research as it relates to assessment, intervention and evaluation of clinical and community practices. EPAS Competencies 4, 7, 8 & 9
7. Practice person-centered and collaborative community partnerships across diverse settings. EPAS Competency 6

Course Outcomes

1. Analyze the various components of law and how the exchanges between legal professionals and social workers coincide when an individual, family, or group is faced with legal issues and institutions. Program Outcomes 1 & 2 (As measured by Discussion, Course Papers, and PPT presentation).
2. Synthesize the various pathways between social work practice and advocacy and the law and legal systems and the derivative influence of equity, equality, and effective delivery and allocation of resources Program Outcomes 4 & 6 (As measured by Discussion, Course Papers, and PPT presentation). 
3. Justify the application of interdisciplinary research and evaluating social work and law and preventative and discriminatory and oppressive policies. Program Outcomes 3 & 6 (As measured by Discussion, Course Papers, and PPT presentation).
4. Assess the impact of social work practice and the law on service utilization and outcomes for vulnerable groups. Program Outcomes 3 & 5 (As measured by Discussion, Course Papers, and PPT presentation).

Assignments

Discussion Forums 

Discussion Board: You will have whole class and small group discussions. For small group discussion boards, you will be pre-divided randomly into groups of 5 or so and will participate only in your group. 

Due Dates: You will have Small Group Discussions due in Weeks 2, 4, and 6. There will be Whole Class Discussions due in Weeks 1, 3, 5, 7, and 8.  All discussion questions require an initial response by Saturday, 11:59 PM ET and responses must be completed by Tuesday, 11:59 PM ET unless otherwise stated; however, feel free to post your work earlier in the learning week if you choose. 

What are initial response posts?

Initial responses are a direct response to the discussion forum question(s) and must include at least 200 words for each question and two references to the text or readings. You must follow APA for the discussion boards which means that for any source that is used you must include a reference at the end of the post which conforms to APA. 

What are response posts?

Responses are posts that demonstrate that you are responding to at least two students. You are expected to actively participate in the forums each week an assignment is due. 

Responses to others must add substantively to the discussion by building upon classmates’ ideas or posing critical questions to further the discussion. For example, a posting of “I agree with what people are saying” is not sufficient. What is considered sufficient is initiating further discussion; promoting further thought; providing critical or integrative dialogue; providing effective support or encouragement; challenging by showing supporting literature or other documentation, and/or self-reflecting regarding the topic.

In the discussion boards, what you write is subject to the NASW Code of Ethics 2.01(a-c) (2017) as students are as bound by the Code as any licensed social workers. You are expected to be respectful to each other when agreeing or disagreeing about a policy or legal point and to respond with research, literature, evidence, or data not personal invective or any use of profanity. If you use personal experience please de-identify any other person or organization to protect your privacy and that of any third person or entity. You are also expected to maintain the confidentiality of any postings and not share any of that information outside the course. 

Your instructor will grade each discussion forum using the criteria listed in the “College-Wide Discussion Rubric”.

Major Assignments

Short Paper 1

This is a 4-5 page paper (not counting cover sheet and APA reference page) due at the end of Week 2. The paper will be double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman font. This is not an essay paper, nor a short answer paper. Please do not underestimate the value of the assigned readings as sources for these papers. You may reference outside sources but you should make sure that you answer each section and apply the readings or other assigned material. This paper requires a critical analysis of the connections between the assigned topics.  

In Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl (2013), a majority of the United States Supreme Court, in a badly divided Court, wrote the following: 

“This case is about a little girl (Baby Girl) who is classified as an Indian because she is 1.2% (3/256) Cherokee. Because Baby Girl is classified in this way, the South Carolina Supreme Court held that certain provisions of the federal Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 required her to be taken, at the age of 27 months, from the only parents she had ever known and handed over to her biological father, who had attempted to relinquish his parental rights and who had no prior contact with the child. The provisions of the federal statute at issue here do not demand this result.” 

One of the Justices, dissenting from the majority wrote that: 

“The Court’s opinion, it seems to me, needlessly demeans the rights of parenthood. It has been the constant practice of the common law to respect the entitlement of those who bring a child into the world to raise that child. We do not inquire whether leaving a child with his parents is “in the best interest of the child.”  It sometimes is not; he would be better off raised by someone else. But parents have their rights, no less than children do. This father wants to raise his daughter, and the statute amply protects his right to do so. There is no reason in law or policy to dilute that protection.” 

1. What was the “intentional act” of policy [law] which was being argued about in this case and why was it enacted?
2. As a social worker, how would you advocate for the human rights of the child and social justice for that child [see text pp. 5-6]? 
3. If you, as a social worker, were advocating for a change in ICWA, what aspects of the arguments by Hodge, or Lundy & Van Wormer do you think most effective? 

Short Paper 2

This is a 4-5 page paper (not counting Title and Reference pages) due before the start of Week 5. The paper will be double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman font. This is not an essay paper, nor a short answer paper. Please do not underestimate the value of the assigned readings as sources for these papers. You may reference outside sources but you should make sure that you answer each section and apply the readings or other assigned material. This paper requires a critical analysis of the connections between the assigned topics.  

In Voisine v. United States (2016), the Supreme Court held that a domestic violence conviction is a misdemeanor crime of violence for purposes of limiting access to firearms. The petitioners argued that domestic assaults committed recklessly—but not knowingly or intentionally—do not qualify as a “crime of domestic violence as defined by 18 U.S.C. §§921(a)(33)(A) and 922(g)(9), and that reckless domestic assaults do not involve the “use of physical force” as necessitated by the law. 

The majority held that reckless assaults satisfy the definition of “use of physical force” and stated that “[a] person who assaults another recklessly ‘use[s]’ force, no less than one who carries out that same action knowingly or intentionally.” As such, the holding established that the federal ban on firearms possession applies to any person with a prior misdemeanor conviction for the “use of physical force” in a domestic violence context, including actions committed recklessly.

The dissent wrote that “The ‘use of physical force’ against a family member includes cases where a person intentionally commits a violent act against a family member. And the term includes at least some cases where a person engages in a violent act that results in an unintended injury to a family member. But the term does not include nonviolent, reckless acts that cause physical injury or offensive touching.” 

1. The Second Amendment, which protects the “right to bear arms,” was invoked in this case as an argument in the media. As a social worker advocating, under the NASW Code of Ethics, for the right of self-determination and autonomy for individuals, what do you argue for clients who may have committed a reckless act of domestic violence but still want to legally hunt in his or her state? 
2. Applying the analysis from Gilfus, et al., do you agree or not agree that, “An additional limitation of the family violence method of studying IPV is the possibility of reporting bias. Kimmel (2002) argues that women tend to overreport their own use of violence and underreport their partner’s, while men tend to underreport their own use of violence and overreport their partner’s. If this is, in fact, the case, gender matters methodologically (p. 251). 
3. Should there be any exception to an act of IPV as a matter of policy and what you would argue for a policy change and, if no policy change, why? 

Final Short Paper

This is a 4-5 page paper (not counting Tile and Reference pages) due before the start of Week 7. The paper will be double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman font. This is not an essay paper, nor a short answer paper. Please do not underestimate the value of the assigned readings as sources for these papers. You may reference outside sources but you should make sure that you answer each section and apply the readings or other assigned material. This paper requires a critical analysis of the connections between the assigned topics.  

This year the United States Supreme Court decided FLOWERS v. MISSISSIPPI on June 21, 2019. The majority wrote that: 

“Four critical facts, taken together, require reversal. First, in the six trials combined, the State employed its peremptory challenges to strike 41 of the 42 black prospective jurors that it could have struck—a statistic that the State acknowledged at oral argument in this Court. Second, in the most recent trial, the sixth trial, the State exercised peremptory strikes against five of the six black prospective jurors.  Third, at the sixth trial, in an apparent effort to find pretextual reasons to strike black prospective jurors, the State engaged in dramatically disparate questioning of black and white prospective jurors. Fourth, the State then struck at least one black prospective juror, Carolyn Wright, who was similarly situated to white prospective jurors who were not struck by the State.”

The dissenting opinion wrote the following: 

“The majority’s opinion is so manifestly incorrect that I must proceed to the merits. Flowers presented no evidence whatsoever of purposeful race discrimination by the State in selecting the jury during the trial below.  Each of the five challenged strikes was amply justified on race-neutral grounds timely offered by the State at the Batson hearing. None of the struck black jurors was remotely comparable to the seated white jurors. And nothing else about the State’s conduct at jury selection—whether trivial mistakes of fact or supposed disparate questioning— provides any evidence of purposeful discrimination based on race.”

For purposes of this paper, please review Exhibit 1.2 in the text (pp. 17-18) and answer the following questions: 

1. As a social worker helping victims of crime and working for the prosecutor’s office, what do tell the family about this decision as policy and that a new trial (after 6 prior trials) is required because the jury selection was unconstitutional? 
2. This section must include how social workers or professionals intersecting with legal systems can play a key role in supporting the proposal or action of change. Integrating your readings, and as a social worker, what policy change, which is feasible, would you implement to reduce the “school to prison pipeline”? 
3. What ethical issues would you find most challenging working in prison systems with someone accused of such a crime and facing the death penalty? Be specific as to the Principle and its nexus to the NASW Code of Ethics. 

Testimony Presentation

Choose one of your papers and create a policy presentation in the form of a testimony. Your presentation should include five PowerPoint slides and you will record a five-minute video of yourself giving the presentation. Your presentation should be created as if you are arguing for a policy change in the law before Congress.

You must follow the five-minute time limit. The PPT must include the following:

1. First Slide: The cover slide containing your name, degree(s), the title of the presentation, date, and contact information. 
2. Second Slide: What is the specific social problem you are describing such as poverty, crime, child abuse, IPV, and what is the policy (legislation) you are discussing in the context of that social problem?
3. Third Slide: Is there any evidence-informed research which describes the efficacy (or not) of the policy you are testifying about? You only need to cite one or two papers for this slide, but it must be research and not simply opinion. 
   • Example: Cho, H., & Wilke, D. J. (2005). How has the Violence Against Women Act affected the response of the criminal justice system to domestic violence. Journal of Society & Social Welfare, 32, pp. 125-139.
   • Example: Price, J. M., Chamberlain, P., Landsverk, J., & Reid, J. (2009). KEEP foster parent training intervention: Model description and effectiveness. Child & Family Social Work, 14(2), pp. 233-242.
4. Fourth Slide: What is your specific policy change in this law which is consistent with social justice and the NASW Code of Ethics? The policy change must be feasible in that it can be enacted into law (not has to be, but can be) and is not just about tossing funding at a social problem.
5. Fifth Slide: Explain the core lessons you learned in this course with at least four bullet-points in the slide.

Grading Policy

The School of Social Work uses the following grading system for all courses with the exception of field education courses. Students are expected to maintain a “B” (3.0) average over the course of their study. Students with less than a GPA of 3.0 will be placed on academic probation. Students must have an overall GPA of 3.0 in order to receive their Master’s Degree.

Your grade in this course will be determined by the following criteria:

Grade Breakdown

Assignment	Point Value	% of Grade
Whole Class Discussion Boards (4 @ 2.5 points each)	10	10
Small Group Discussion Boards (2 @ 3 points, 1 @ 4)	10	10
Short Paper 1	10	15
Short Paper 2	15	15
Final Short Paper	25	25
Testimony Presentation	25	25
Week 8 Reflection Post	5	5
Total	100 points	100

Grade Scale

Grade	Points Grade	Point Average (GPA)
A	94 – 100%	4.00
A-	90 – 93%	3.75
B+	87 – 89%	3.50
B	84 – 86%	3.00
B-	80 – 83%	2.75
C+	77 – 79%	2.50
C	74 – 76%	2.00
C-	70 – 73%	1.75
D	64 – 69%	1.00
F	00 – 63%	0.00