UMBC School of Social Work Program and the FSWI Receive a Hrabowski Innovation Fund Competition Award
Dr. Carolyn Tice, dean of the school of social work/BSW program at UMBC, in collaboration with Dr. Christine Callahan of the FSWI and UMSSW doctoral student Sally Hageman, received a Hrabowski Innovation Fund Competition Award in December 2013 to conduct an intervention study on financial self-efficacy in BSW students at UMBC.
The project involves providing six trainings to the BSW students throughout the year on topics ranging from debt literacy, budgeting, financial capability and self-efficacy, as well as application of these and other materials to vulnerable populations that these students will be serving. Both as college students and budding social workers, BSW students are an ideal group in which to examine perceptions, financial knowledge and self-efficacy, and career plans. There is intriguing research on how social workers are addressing financial hardship in their clients, and it is demonstrating that there are gaps in their educational backgrounds on working effectively with individuals, families, and communities regarding their complex financial struggles. Closely interwoven with this is that they often feel ill-equipped not only to help deal with clients’ financial issues, but also feel financially vulnerable themselves.
The goals of the project are to increase and enhance students’ financial self-efficacy and to learn and apply material to clients’ needs as well. This is an innovative and novel approach to understanding students’ self-efficacy and knowledge, and will assist them in improving and enhancing macro and clinical social work practice.
For further information about this study, please contact Dr. Christine Callahan at ccallahan@ssw.umaryland.edu.
Drs. Carolyn Tice (UMBC) and Christine Callahan and Sally Hageman, MSW, will present their paper "Financial Capability from Students' Perspectives" at the BPD Annual Conference, which will be held March 30-April 3, 2016, in Dallas, Texas.
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