When was social services created

The Elementary and Secondary School Education Act overturned longstanding precedents and directed federal aid to local schools in order to equalize educational opportunities for children. In , the Model Cities Act targeted certain urban areas with comprehensive services and emphasized the concept of community control. Although the social work profession did not influence public policies on the scale it had in the s, social workers played key roles throughout the s in various anti-poverty and community-action programs and helped train individuals in new organizations like the Peace Corps and VISTA.

President Nixon shifted the administration of anti-poverty programs to states and localities. This legislation established the concept of revenue sharing and led ultimately to the dismantling of the Office of Economic Opportunity. The most significant social policy accomplishments of the Nixon Administration, however, were the Social Security Amendments of , which centralized and standardized aid to disabled people and low-income elderly and indexed benefits to inflation.

Food stamps, child nutrition, and railroad retirement programs were also linked to cost-of-living rates. The passage of Title XX of the Social Security Act in January reinforced the popular concept of federal "revenue sharing" which provided states with maximum flexibility in planning social services while promoting fiscal accountability. During the Ford and Carter administrations, Title XX shaped the direction of both public and nonprofit social services, with a particular focus on issues of welfare dependency, child abuse and neglect, domestic violence, drug abuse, and community mental health.

While poverty continued to decline among the elderly in the s, largely as a consequence of benefit indexing and Medicare, a virtual freeze on Aid for Families with Dependent Children AFDC benefits after and a decline in the purchasing power of wages produced a steady increase in poverty among children, particularly children of color. In the late s, the Carter Administration's creation of block grants that combined formerly categorical programs into broad programmatic areas and established a ceiling on total state expenditures in return for increasing state control of spending patterns was a particularly significant development that had major implications in the s.

Although most social reforms stagnated by the mids, there were considerable changes in the social work profession throughout the decade, including the beginnings of multicultural and gender awareness, which led to the development of new course content and efforts to expand minority recruitment; the growth of multidisciplinary joint degree programs with Schools of Urban Planning, Public Health, Public Policy, Education, and Law; the recognition of the BSW as the entry-level professional degree; and the growth of private practice among social workers.

The policy changes that were inspired by the so-called "Reagan Revolution" of the s compelled social workers to rely increasingly, if not exclusively, on private-sector solutions for social welfare problems.

Entire programs were reduced, frozen, or eliminated. Additional block grants were created in such areas as child welfare and community development. A looming crisis in the funding of Social Security and Medicare was forestalled in through modest tax increases and benefit reductions. At the same time, ballooning federal deficits precluded any major new social welfare initiatives. Consequently, during times of overall prosperity poverty rates soared, particularly among children, young families, and persons of color.

By the early s, the number of people officially listed as "poor" had risen to 36 million. Social workers focused increased attention on developing effective management skills and increased their advocacy activities. From the outset, President Clinton's policy options were severely constrained by the budget deficits his administration inherited. Stymied in the development of an ambitious social welfare agenda, such as a comprehensive national health insurance program, he focused instead on budgetary restraint and the promotion of economic growth.

After considerable debate, he signed a controversial welfare reform bill in which replaced AFDC with block grants to states that included time limits and conditions on the receipt of cash assistance now called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families [TANF]. The legislation also devolved responsibility for welfare program development to states and increased the roles of private-sector and faith-based organizations in program implementation.

President Clinton left office in January with several major social welfare issues unresolved. While some progress was made in providing health care for children in low-income families, over 43 million Americans still lacked coverage.

The soaring cost of prescription drugs threatened the economic well-being of elderly Americans. Proposals to provide this benefit through Medicare and prevent a future crisis in funding for the Social Security system when the "baby boomer" generation retired made little progress in the s because of political gridlock. Finally, looming on the horizon were the potentially catastrophic consequences of enforcing the five-year lifetime cap on TANF recipients as the nation's economy cooled.

Policy developments in the s had serious consequences for the social work profession. Welfare reform led to the restructuring of public welfare departments and to greater pressure on nonprofit organizations to fill gaps in service provision. The advent of managed care in the health and mental health fields dramatically altered the practice of many social workers, as did changes in child welfare policies.

Although political opposition to Affirmative Action programs grew during these years, social workers, particularly in university settings, increasingly emphasized racial, gender, and ethnic diversity in their curricula and recruitment policies.

NASW revised its Code of Ethics to make the pursuit of social justice an ethical imperative, and CSWE required all programs to teach students how to work for economic and social justice. At the same time, organizations such as Americorps were established in to promote greater involvement of young people in communities. With the support of the NIMH Center for Social Work Research and the Society for Social Work and Research, schools of social work significantly increased their funded research and evaluation activities in such areas as mental health, aging, domestic violence, and child welfare.

For over a century the profession of social work has grown and reinvented itself in response to rapid economic and social changes while maintaining its focus on advocating for the needs of the most vulnerable segments of society and improving their well-being. Today, social workers comprise the largest percentage of professionals working in the fields of mental health and family services.

It is estimated that by , there will be about , social workers, more than a thirty-percent increase over ten years. Despite recent changes in society and its commitment to social welfare, the primary mission of social work, as articulated in the NASW Code of Ethics, remains "to enhance human well-being and help meet the basic human needs of all people, with particular attention to the needs and empowerment of people who are vulnerable, oppressed, and living in poverty.

Economic decline highlighted the insufficiency of local and state public relief agencies and ultimately, it revolutionized the role the federal government played in social welfare efforts. Government programs began evolving under the Roosevelt administration. The New Deal led to dozens of social welfare acts including the Social Security Act of Social welfare programs expanded to include housing, recreation, cultural activities, social insurance, and child welfare programs.

Many social workers were given war-related assignments during World War II to develop services for communities impacted by the war. Social workers on these assignments helped soldiers and their families cope with injuries and other medical problems. A special classification for military social workers was developed from this work. Following the end of World War II, efforts were made to enhance the professional status of social work. The Council on Social Work Education was formed in The National Association of Social Workers was created in to further the professional status of social work.

Various social work groups and organizations that had already been established throughout the country consolidated to form this new association. Simmons School of Social Work alumnus Dr. With this declaration, the recognition of poverty as a social problem took hold.

In the s, a belief that the influx of social programs in the U. Starting with with the Nixon Administration, the federal government pulled back on the social reform of the previous decades.

However, there were still positive changes in the field during the s. Universities and colleges established the BSW — Bachelor of Social Work— as an entry-level degree program and created joint degrees with other public policy sectors. The privatization of social work practices also grew, giving social workers greater autonomy and legitimacy.

Many federal programs were reduced or eliminated during the Reagan administration in the s. These cutbacks in government agencies resulted in social workers relying heavily on private-sector solutions for social welfare problems.

Although the early committees included the AASSW as a nonvoting member, consolidation of the education and practitioner organizations was not pursued. In , the seven practitioner and researcher organizations joined to form the National Association of Social Workers NASW , which had 22, members after the merger. Published in , the 13 volume Curriculum Study included volumes on undergraduate education, specialized practice methods administration, community organization, group work, and casework , fields of practice corrections, public social services, and rehabilitation , and curriculum areas human growth and behavior, research, social welfare policy and services, and values and ethics Boehm, The intent of both efforts was to unify social work by providing a common set of concepts and educational experiences.

The commission issued Action for Mental Health , a report that called for renewed investment in mental health. The new liberal Kennedy administration, in , proposed an expansion in community mental health programs, based on the report and on California's experience with community mental health centers. By the end of the decade, social workers provided the majority of mental health care in the United States.

The Kennedy administration initiated other projects, notably in public welfare and delinquency prevention. After Kennedy delivered a special message on public welfare, Congress enacted the Public Welfare Amendments to the Social Security Act PL 87— , which provided federal funds for state social service programs and for educating social workers to work in state public welfare programs. The act increased opportunities for public welfare personnel to enter MSW programs and resulted in expanded opportunities in public welfare programs for professional social workers.

Two years later, a federal task force projected an increased need for social work personnel and called for additional investment in social work education, including the development of undergraduate education for social work U. President Kennedy's Committee on Juvenile Delinquency provided demonstration grants for antidelinquency programs. The example of the President's Committee led the new Johnson administration to propose a War on Poverty in A vigorous antipoverty program would be directed by quasi-public entities, local Community Action Programs.

Some social workers were involved in the design of the program, while others looked askance at its nonprofessional, some thought antiprofessional, approach to solving the problem of poverty. Voluntary social service agencies found new opportunities for contracting to provide services to the poor, from community organization to family counseling.

The effect of the expansion of government social welfare services during the Great Depression and after World War II was to shift the most important source of funding and practice for social work from the voluntary, nonprofit sector to the public sector, and to emphasize health and mental health programs.

Other sectors, such as corrections and child welfare, medicalized their approaches, as talk of treatment for offenders and dependent children began to dominate professional discourse in these areas. The increasing complexity of the emerging welfare state resulted in an increasing emphasis on policy, planning, and administration in social work curricula and in practice.

Many programs in the Kennedy—Johnson era, from the antidelinquency programs of the Kennedy years to the community action, older Americans, and Model Cities programs of the Johnson administration, relied on increasingly complex federal relationships with state and local governments managed by community planners, many with social work credentials. If the decade was contentious, the social work profession seemed vibrant during the s. In , the membership of NASW reached nearly 46,, doubling its membership in its first decade.

In doing so, NASW endorsed the conclusion of the Task Force on Social Work Education and Manpower that baccalaureate social workers were needed to fill the many social work positions created by the expansion of social welfare programs in the s. CSWE subsequently developed standards and accreditation procedures for undergraduate social work programs. However, some believed that recognition of the BSW had deprofessionalized social work. Federal spending for social welfare increased during the s, but employment for social workers stagnated as a result of several related trends Patterson, State public welfare departments separated social services from public assistance payments, reversing the logic of the Public Welfare Amendments.

Often justified as cost-saving measures, these changes, which were particularly important in public child welfare services, limited employment opportunities for professional social workers even as they reduced the quality of services for clients.

By the late s, many social services were provided by private or quasi-public agencies or by private practitioners under contract to public authorities rather than by public agency employees. Many conservatives around Reagan were suspicious of social workers, whom they viewed as misguided philanthropists, harming poor people even as they attempted to assist them. In response, social work practitioner organizations lobbied for legal regulation. Licensing by the state, accomplished in varying degrees in all of the states by the s, would assure the public of quality social services while increasing the demand for licensed social workers, advocates believed.

Licensing also facilitated the growth of private practice, as many states included an independent practice license for experienced MSWs. Despite a new democratic administration in Washington, the trends of the s continued during the Clinton administration—growth in government contracting with nonprofit and for profit organizations, increasing reliance on third-party payments, and privatization of social services.

The act eliminated a year-old public assistance program for poor families, Aid to Families with Dependent Children AFDC , replacing it with a block grant program, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families TANF , which imposed work requirements and time limits for the receipt of public assistance. As the 21st century began, new organizations of practitioners, educators, and researchers arose to complement CSWE and NASW, creating a situation reminiscent of the s.

Research, increasingly emphasized by social work educators, did not seem to influence social work practice, signaling a potentially dangerous division between academics and practitioners. NASW held a Social Work Summit in , which brought 43 different social work organizations together to discuss coalitions and collaborative undertakings, and a Social Work Congress in to identify common goals for the next 10 years. Although the social work profession seemed fragmented, a number of organizations of practitioners and educators were able to work together on interorganizational projects to promote social work research and focus the profession's political advocacy activities.

The number of social work education programs at the BSW and MSW levels grew during the last decade of the 20th century and in the early 21st century. By , there were accredited social work education programs in the United States, including baccalaureate programs and masters programs Council on Social Work Education, , in addition to 84 doctoral programs Group for the Advancement of Doctoral Education, Over , people in the United States identified themselves as social workers.

However, many of those employed as social workers were not professionally educated. Of over , licensed social workers, less than half belong to NASW. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicted that the number of social work positions would increase more rapidly than the average for all occupations, particularly as the population aged.

Fragmentation, together with privatization, deprofessionalization, and competition with other professions in a shrinking human service arena provided challenges for the profession. Printed from Encyclopedia of Social Work.

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Social Work Profession: History. Paul H. Stuart Paul H. Stuart Florida International University. Keywords social work profession professionalization personal service social services. Updated in this version Bibliography updated to reflect recent research. The Emergence of the Social Question During the late 19th century , industrialization created an urban society in a globalizing economy.

Social Work as an Occupation By the first decade of the 20th century , a separate occupational status for charity workers had emerged. From Occupation to Profession Social work education programs expanded during the years — , and even more rapidly during the next decade, as a result of changes in charity organization and the expansion of hospital social work, school social work, and child welfare.

The Great Depression: A Crisis for the New Profession The worldwide economic contraction that began in resulted in economic and social crises as the demand for products slackened, workers lost their jobs, and political unrest toppled established governments around the world.

Challenges and Trends Although the social work profession seemed fragmented, a number of organizations of practitioners and educators were able to work together on interorganizational projects to promote social work research and focus the profession's political advocacy activities. Further Reading Hansen, J. Social welfare history project. Huff, D. Every picture tells a story.

Social Work , 43 6 , —,. Leiby, J. A history of social welfare and social work in the United States. Leighninger, L. Social work: Search for identity. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Lubove, R. The professional altruist: The emergence of social work as a career, — Maas, H. National Conference on Social Welfare.

National Institutes of Health. NIH history. Odum, H. Public welfare activities. Reynolds, B. Social work and social living: Explorations in philosophy and practice.

NASW classics series. Originally published in Social Security Administration.