Supervisors play pivotal roles in the quality of services delivered by the teams they support. Not only do they teach, manage, and oversee their supervisees, but they are the first to whom line workers turn for guidance in their direct practice with challenging clients.
There are currently a limited number of social work supervision continuing education programs available, and the majority of MSW curriculums include little or no information on supervision. Social Work Practice Fellows was created as an innovative effort to fill this gap, and further addresses supervision training by addressing context and setting-specific and specialized supervision practices, including health, mental health, families, trauma and substance use in an intensive in-person interactive setting.
Nonetheless, all social work settings include a diverse clientele across the lifespan who experience challenges and complexities beyond any one scope of expertise. Such issues are tackled in the SWPF program as well in order to advance the skillset of supervisors and to broaden their supervision abilities.
The approach of the current SWPF program is unique in both its curriculum and content while building upon previously established models of outreach and recruitment as well as effective educational approaches.