This journal brings authentic experiences of our social workers, doctors and teachers working for the International Scientific Group of Applied Preventive Medicine I-GAP Vienna in Austria, where we have been preparing students for the social practise over a number of years. Our goal is to create an appropriate studying programme for social workers, a programme which would help them to fully develop their knowledge, skills and qualification. The quality level in social work studying programme is increasing along with the growing demand for social workers.
Students want to grasp both: theoretical knowledge and also the practical models used in social work. And it is our obligation to present and help students understand the theory of social work as well as showing them how to use these theoretical findings in evaluating the current social situation, setting the right goals and planning their projects.
This is a multidimensional process including integration on many levels. Students must respect client’s individuality, value the social work and ethics. They must be attentive to their client’s problems and do their best in applying their theoretical knowledge into practice.
It is a challenge to deliver all this to our students. That is also why we have decided to start publishing our journal. We prefer to use the term ‘clinical social work’ rather than social work even though the second term mentioned is more common. There is some tension in the profession of a social worker coming from the incongruity about the aim of the actual social work practice. The question is whether its mission is a global change of society or an individual change within families. What we can agree on, is that our commitment is to help people reducing and solving the problems which result from their unfortunate social conditions. We believe that it is not only our professional but also ethical responsibility to provide therapeutic help to individual and families whose lives have been marked with serious social difficulties.
Finding answers and solutions to these problems should be a part of a free and independent discussion forum within this journal. We would like to encourage you – social workers, students, teachers and all who are interested, to express your opinions and ideas by publishing in our journal. Also, there is an individual category for students’ projects.
In the past few years there have been a lot of talks about the language suitable for use in the field of the social work. According to Freud, a client may be understood as a patient and a therapist is to be seen as a doctor. Terminology used to describe the relationship between the two also depends on theoretical approach. Different theories use different vocabulary as you can see also on the pages of our journal.
Specialization of clinical social work programmes provides a wide range of education. We are determined to pass our knowledge to the students and train their skills so they can one day become professionals in the field of social work. Lately, we have been witnessing some crisis in the development of theories and methods used in clinical social work. All the contributions in this journal are expressing efforts to improve the current state. This issue of CWS Journal brings articles about social work, psychology and other social sciences.