To reflect the common priorities of schools and agencies in curriculum development while allowing a suitable degree of autonomy, CalSWEC’s Curriculum Committee, chaired by Dr. Ben Cuellar of Fresno State University and staffed by Sherrill Clark, assembles an array of common practice competencies for which each school would prepare its child welfare students. An advisory committee of school an agency child welfare educators refines this to create a draft of core curriculum competencies.
The Ford Foundation and the local foundation community provide the base of startup funding for the proposed partnership. The Ford Foundation offers to provide three years of support for the project with the possibility of an additional two-year extension. Eight California foundations agree to match the Ford Foundation grant. They are the Elise Haas Fund, the Walter S. Johnson Foundation, the Louis R. Lurie Foundation, the Community Foundation of Santa Clara, the San Francisco Foundation, the Stuart Foundation, the Von Löben Sels Foundation, and the Zellerbach Family Fund.
With the commitment of the ten graduate schools of social work and CWDA, the help of the California Chapter of NASW, and Ford Foundation funding, the California Center for Graduate Social Work Education for the Public and Non-Profit Social Services is created. Dr. Specht, Dean of UC Berkeley’ s School of Social Welfare, becomes principal investigator. Soon after the center’s birth, it is renamed the California Social Work Education Center (CalSWEC). Dr. Bart Grossman, field director at UC Berkeley’s School of Social Welfare, is named CalSWEC’s executive director. The CalSWEC Acting Board of Directors meet for the first time in San Diego. The deans of the three Los Angeles area schools of social work, Leonard Schneiderman of UCLA, Rino Patti of USC, and Jim Kelly of Long Beach State, establish a partnership with the LA County Department of Child and Family Services, directed by Peter Digre, to provide pre-service and in-service training for L.A. county employees. This partnership opens the door for Title IV-E funding of university-based child welfare training in California.
At the CalSWEC state conference in December, the draft of the core curriculum competencies is presented to a group of about 80 agency directors, deans, faculty, and staff. The group provides input for the creation of a final list of competencies and identifies regional priorities for implementation. At the conference, the California Child Welfare Education Partnership Agreement is signed by Dr. Anita Harbert, president of the CalSWEC Board of Directors and director of the social work program at San Diego State University; Marsena Buck, president of the California Chapter of NASW and CWDA; Loren Suter, deputy director for Children and Families of the California Department of Social Services (CDSS); and Dr. Grossman. The agreement promotes a partnership among the CDSS, NASW, CalSWEC, CWDA, and the Office of State Programs of the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to professionalize California’s child welfare services by creating a state financial aid program for social work education based on Title IV-E of the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (P.L. 96-272) and incorporating the competency-based child welfare curriculum. The collaborative partners begin to talk about how practice-based research can inform social work education and improve curriculum development.
At the request of the California Mental Health Directors Association, CalSWEC helps create a program in public mental health to parallel CalSWEC’s child welfare project. Funding from the San Francisco Foundation and the Kaiser Foundation supports a curriculum competency development process led by Dr. Norita Vlach of San Jose State University.
The state Department of Mental Health sponsors a Social Work Mental Health Education Conference, which CalSWEC helps design with the Western Interstate Consortium for Higher Education.
The California Mental Health Directors Association signs a partnership with CalSWEC based on the core Mental Health Competencies. The first Title IV-E MSW program stipend recipients—a total of 98 students—graduate. CalSWEC establishes a unique program of empirical research directed toward improvement of education and practice with priorities established by the agencies. The CalSWEC grant becomes the single largest sponsored project at the University of California, Berkeley. Loma Linda University and Stanislaus State University become the 11th and 12th graduate schools of social work, respectively, to participate in the Title IV-E MSW program. The first empirically based curriculum is completed. CalSWEC coordinates the Region IX conference on implementing the federal Family Support Act, hosting the gathering of over 300 participants at the Cathedral Hill Hotel in San Francisco.
Distance education programs, coordinated by California State University, Long Beach, are initiated at California State University campuses at Humboldt and Chico to accommodate counties that are beyond the reach of existing MSW programs.
The CalSWEC-funded Child Welfare Resource Library is established at Long Beach State under the leadership of Dr. Janet Black. In partnership with UC Berkeley's School of Social Welfare and the federal Children’s Bureau, CalSWEC receives funding for a three-year Child Welfare Fellows Project to provide faculty development awards to two groups of tenured faculty across the county. The fellows conduct research in public child welfare agencies and improve their curriculum instruction With the support of the federal Children's Bureau, CalSWEC hosts a national invitational conference on Title IV-E child welfare partnerships. Dr. Nancy Dickinson, of the Northern Child Welfare Training Academy of the UC Davis Extension, succeeds Dr. Grossman as executive director of CalSWEC. The Partnership Newsletter, a Children's Bureau-funded publication, is contracted to CalSWEC.
CalSWEC contracts with CDSS to help develop, implement, and support five regional child welfare training academies throughout the state to provide in-service training and education for public child welfare agency staff, as well as to support and increase staff retention, in California's 58 counties. The first regional academy that CalSWEC subcontracts with, the Public Child Welfare Training Academy, Southern Region, begins operation. It is a joint venture of San Diego State University, CSU San Bernardino, and Imperial, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, and San Diego Counties.
CalSWEC hosts the first faculty development institute in partnership with the UC Berkeley School of Social Welfare and the federal Children’s Bureau. The three-year Child Welfare Fellows Project provides faculty development awards to tenured faculty across the country so they conduct research at their local public social services agencies and use this to improve their schools’ curriculum and instruction. The first cohort involves ten fellows.
The Central California Public Social Services Training Academy begins operation. With its main office at Fresno State University, the academy serves Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Stanislaus, Tulare, and Ventura Counties.
CalSWEC hosts the second faculty development institute involving 14 Child Welfare Fellows. With funding from the federal Children’s Bureau, CalSWEC begins a three-year project to develop and evaluate curriculum to train professionals in domestic violence, substance abuse, foster care, mental health programs, and the legal system to develop collaborative skills in concurrent planning (a California legislative mandate to improve the stability and legal permanence of children) for children and families in the child welfare system.
The first cohort of the distance education students graduates.
CSU, Los Angeles becomes the 13th graduate school of social work during academic year 1998–1999. Under the leadership of CSU, Long Beach, new distance education programs are implemented to serve the Bakersfield and mid-Southern coastal (California State University-Channel Islands) areas. The Bay Area Academy begins operation. It serves Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Monterey, Napa, San Benito, San Francisco, San Joaquin, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Solano, and Sonoma Counties. The First National Human Services Training Evaluation Symposium is held to discuss issues related to training evaluation in the human services. It is co-sponsored by CalSWEC, the National Staff Development and Training Association of American Public Human Services Association, and the American Humane Association. CalSWEC hosts the third faculty development institute involving all 24 Child Welfare Fellows. Dr. Sherrill Clark succeeds Dr. Dickinson as executive director of CalSWEC. CSU, Bakersfield becomes the 14th graduate school of social work during academic year 1998–1999.
CalSWEC receives a grant from the CDSS to develop a plan for the implementation of a standardized curriculum that all child welfare workers would have to complete successfully before assuming an independent caseload.
New space is allocated for CalSWEC, allowing for expansion of its quarters at UC Berkeley’s School of Social Welfare. The American Indian Graduate Recruitment Project for Title IV-E students moves to CSU, Stanislaus. CalSWEC cosponsors the Second National Human Services Training Evaluation Symposium. CalSWEC’s Board of Directors meets to revise its mission statement so it reflects a reaffirmation of the organization's original commitment to education for the public human services in California. |
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