Class Descriptions

The class descriptions displayed below are for the past Fall 2021 term and may not reflect the current curriculum.
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SW529

Independent Studies: Welfare of Children & Families

Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
Permission of Instructor
Pathway Elective For:
Children, Youth, and Families
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SW540

Trauma Basics

Grading Method:
S/U
Credits:
1 Credit Hour
Prerequisites:
None
Pathway Elective For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse, Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course is currently taught as SW 540, which is a workshop-based inter-professional education course offered by UM School of Social Work in partnership with the School of Nursing and School of Education. It is the first course in a 3-course sequence in Trauma-Informed Practice (TIP). SW 541 and SW 542 are also included as electives in the WCF pathway. Completion of all 3 courses fulfills the requirement of a trauma certificate. This first course will provide basic, foundational knowledge about the cognitive, social-emotional, behavioral, and health-related outcomes of trauma in children. A key focus of the course will be on enhancing awareness of trauma in children; assessing and responding to the needs of children who encounter trauma; and changing systems to become more responsive to vulnerable children and their families. Exploration of factors known to promote resilience and well-being will be emphasized and examined throughout the course. The course will examine principles of interprofessional education, which focuses on helping students in the professions of social work, nursing, and education work collaboratively in generalist and specialty practice roles.
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SW541

Trauma Informed Practice (Education)

Grading Method:
S/U
Credits:
1 Credit Hour
Prerequisites:
SW 540
Pathway Elective For:
Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course will provide foundational knowledge about trauma-informed practice. A primary goal is preparing students for interprofessional approaches to trauma-informed prevention and intervention. A key focus will be on teachers, social workers, and nurses collaborating to use specific trauma-informed practices for addressing young people's academic, social-emotional, behavioral, and health needs.
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SW542

Creating and Sustaining Trauma-Informed Systems (Nursing)

Grading Method:
S/U
Credits:
1 Credit Hour
Prerequisites:
SW 540
Pathway Elective For:
Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course will provide foundational knowledge about developing and sustaining a school or organizational culture that is trauma-informed. The course will incorporate principles of interprofessional education, which focuses on helping students in the professions work collaboratively in generalist and specialty practice roles. A primary goal of the course is to prepare students to use interprofessional and team-based strategies to achieve organizational change. A key focus will be on teachers, social workers, and nurses going beyond their practice role to collaborate on organizational work. Examples including educating colleagues, planning for a long-term project, evaluating programs, and obtaining resources to sustain collaborative models and programs to address trauma in schools.
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SW600

Behavioral, Psychosocial and Ecological Aspects of Health, Mental Health and Disease

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
Foundation Essentials Required
Pathway Requirement For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host)
Pathway Elective For:
Social Work Practice with Older Adults and Families from a Lifespan Perspective, Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course will survey the distribution, determinants, and biomedical, psychological and behavioral aspects of health inclusive of physical, mental and behavioral health and disease across the life span from pre-birth to death. Social, economic, environmental, structural and cultural variations in and determinants of health, disease, and quality of life will be addressed, including the influence of factors such as race, gender, sexual orientation, geography, ability, biological, genetic and epigenetic factors. Barriers to access and utilization, geopolitical influences, environmental justice, social injustice, oppression and racism, historical trends, and future directions will be reviewed. Health beliefs and models of health behavior (e.g. Health Belief Model, Theory of Planned Behavior,) and structural determinants of health (e.g. Minority Stress Theory) will be presented, including help-seeking and utilization of health services. Stress, allostatic load, coping and social support, adaptation to chronic illness, the influences of privilege, stigma and discrimination, quality of life, and death and dying will also be covered.
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SW603

Interpersonal Practice Interventions in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Children, Youth, Transitional Youth, and Families)

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
SW506 & SW601 (concurrent enrollment in SW601 permitted if necessary)
Pathway Requirement For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host)
Pathway Elective For:
Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course will build on intervention approaches introduced in the essential courses and will promote more advanced engagement, assessment, intervention and evaluation skills in work with children, youth, transitional age youth, and families. Special attention will be given to issues of diversity as it relates to building therapeutic relationships and intervening with children, youth, transitional age youth, and their families. This course focuses on advanced skill building regarding core practice interventions (e.g. engagement, contracting, problem-solving, emotional regulation, behavioral activation, cognitive restructuring, etc.) using specific brief, evidence-based and/or evidence-informed interventions including prevention, treatment and recovery as well as longer-term treatment and support for these children and youth as appropriate. Examples of practice interventions may include: behavioral/cognitive interventions, motivational interventions; resiliency based interventions, brief treatments for mental health and substance use problems, crisis intervention, parent management interventions, and group interventions. Intervention strategies will be analyzed in the context of delivering trauma-informed culturally responsive interventions.
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SW604

Advanced Evidence-Informed Interpersonal Practice with Families

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
SW506 & SW601 (concurrent enrollment in SW601 permitted if necessary)
Pathway Requirement For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host)
Pathway Elective For:
Social Work Practice with Older Adults and Families from a Lifespan Perspective, Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This advanced practice course builds on content from the previous foundational course(s) and focuses on family functioning within diverse client populations. The focus of this course is on the development and utilization of family-focused skills and interventions with diverse families in the context of a variety of practice settings such as healthcare, mental health, and other community-based settings. To inform practice interventions, this course will be grounded in the integration of various current family theories (i.e. attachment theory, general systems theory, communication theory, social construction theory and developmental theory, etc) as well as an overarching neurological perspective. Broad definitions of "family" will be used, including extended families, unmarried couples, single parent families, couples across gender identity and sexual orientation spectrums, adult siblings, "fictive kin," and other inclusive definitions. The development of clinical skills for engaging, assessing, and intervening with families will be the primary focus of this course. Focused attention on primary models of family theory and practice will inform intervention techniques and skills taught in the course (i.e., Emotionally-Focused Family Therapy, Internal Family Systems, Narrative Therapy, and additional approach(s) informed by identified theories). This course will address stages of the helping process with families (i.e., engagement, assessment, planning, evaluation, intervention, and termination). During these stages, client-worker differences will be taken into account including a range of diversity dimensions such as ability, age, class, color, culture, ethnicity, family structure, immigration status, gender (including gender identity and gender expression), marital status, national origin, race, religion or spirituality and sexual orientation. Various theoretical approaches will be presented in order to help students understand family structure, communication patterns, and behavioral and coping repertoires. The family will also be studied as part of larger social systems, as having its own life cycles, and as influencing multiple generations.
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SW612

Mental Health and Mental Disorders of Children and Youth

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
None
Pathway Elective For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host), Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course is open to student learners in the health science areas including social work, nursing, pharmacy, and dentistry. This course will present state-of-the-art knowledge and research of mental disorders of children and youth, as well as factors that promote mental health, and prevent mental disorders and substance related problems. Using a clinical case discussion format, this class will highlight mental health diagnoses, comorbidity, and team collaboration across health professions. Social determinants of health/mental health will be used as an organizing framework for discussing the impact of factors associated with health and mental health across diverse cultures, groups and populations. Classification systems of child and youth functioning and disorders will be presented, such as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-Fifth Edition (DSM-5), Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood: DC: 0-5, and the Individuals with Disability Education Act (IDEA). Students will be taught to critically understand both the strengths and limitations of these classification systems and how to use these systems in practice. Competencies related to teamwork and collaboration, values and ethics, and communication will be addressed.
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SW617

Death, Loss and Grief

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
None
Pathway Elective For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host), Social Work Practice with Older Adults and Families from a Lifespan Perspective, Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
This course will address the theoretical framework of human loss and grief from a culturally and philosophically diverse perspective. Students will be provided with information about why and how humans grieve and how grieving is affected by type of loss, socioeconomic and cultural factors, individual personality and family functioning. Attention will be focused on life span development and the meaning of death and loss at different ages. Various types of loss will be discussed from an individual, family, and socio/cultural/ecological perspective. The importance of understanding trauma and its relationship to grief and loss will also be addressed. Coping and resiliency in loss will be explored, emphasizing the diversity of human response and focusing on the significance of social groups in integrating loss. The formation and practice of rituals, and diversity in religious and spiritual experience as a component of coping with loss will be discussed.
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SW618

Research-informed Practices to Prevent Substance Abuse in Racial and Ethnic Minority Adolescents

Grading Method:
Graded
Credits:
3 Credit Hours
Prerequisites:
None
Pathway Elective For:
Interpersonal Practice in Integrated Health, Mental Health, and Substance Abuse (Host), Children, Youth, and Families
Description:
Substance abuse represents a major public health concern facing America’s youth. Although all adolescents are directly or indirectly impacted by substance abuse, racial and ethnic minority youth are disproportionately impacted. Social workers play a key role in health promotion and disease prevention, including prevention, intervention and rehabilitation of substance abuse among racial and ethnic minority adolescents in urban settings. This course will draw from multiple disciplines, including social work, epidemiology, public health, psychology, policy and couple and family therapy, to introduce students to theory and knowledge on substance abuse to inform social work practice with racial and ethnic minority adolescents in urban settings. This course will be guided by models, and the theoretical frameworks which inform them, that have been shown to be efficacious or effective in prevention, intervention, and rehabilitation of substance abuse in adolescents. Therefore, students will be introduced to research-informed substance abuse practices among racial and ethnic minority urban adolescents. For the purposes of this course, substance abuse will include both licit and illicit substances. Students will be asked to demonstrate the ways in which to apply research-informed theory and knowledge in practice settings with racial and ethnic minority urban adolescents.
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