Integrating Financial and Economic Justice Content into Social Work Education.

Area of Science:

• Social Work Education
• Economic Justice Pedagogy

Background:

• Financial and economic justice content is vital for social work education, equipping students to address client financial challenges and advocate for policy change.
• Despite its importance, many social work educators do not integrate this content into their curricula.
• Existing efforts by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) have not fully addressed this gap.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify sociodemographic, personal, and educational factors influencing social work educators' likelihood of teaching financial and economic justice content.
• To apply the diffusion of innovation theory to understand the adoption of this specialized content.

Main Methods:

• Utilized original survey data from 163 social work educators.
• Employed binary logistic regression modeling to analyze factors impacting teaching decisions.

Main Results:

• The highest education level attained by an educator significantly impacts the odds of teaching financial and economic justice.
• The type of course an educator teaches is a meaningful determinant in the adoption of this content.
• Educators' perceived relevance of financial and economic justice content shows a strong, positive association with teaching it.

Conclusions:

• Key intervention points, such as educator's academic background and course type, can be targeted to increase the prevalence of financial and economic justice content.
• Current policy measures supporting the integration of this content have not yet been widely implemented by educators.
• Further strategies are needed to encourage the widespread adoption of financial and economic justice education in social work programs.