Competency 9: Evaluate Practice with Individuals, Families, Groups. Organizations, and Communities

Social work practice embeds assessment as an integral part. Competency 9 mandates that social workers assess the effectiveness of interventions and programs with an ethical strategy and client-centered perspective. Social workers cannot determine whether what they are doing is effective and how to improve the quality of service delivery to the targeted population without assessment.

During my field practicum at the ENDependence Center of Northern Virginia (ECNV) and New Hope Housing of VA, I observed that evaluation is the art of quantification, learning, and improvement. The following are aligned with the 2022 EPAS of the Council on Social Work Education and the NASW Code of Ethics, which include accountability, research-informed practice, and client-centered evaluation methods.

Here I will explain how the field experiences influenced the idea of evaluating the social work practice and how George Mason University (GMU) equipped the author with incorporating data analysis and ethics into the work.

Assessing Individual Practice: Evaluation and development of client outcomes.
At ECNV, I gained experience in assisting the disabled clients at workplace, accommodation and advocacy. The hardest situation that I encountered was a client with mobility disability who was discriminated at workplace while searching for employment.

Initially, I assisted him through:
• Advising him through career counseling and job search service.
• Informing him about his rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
• Connecting him with disability employment networks.
 

In assessing whether these interventions were successful, I:

• Follow-up sessions to track his employment activities in the job search process.
• I also sought his input on what might have assisted him and what remained a problem.
• Employment outcomes were also measured to see if he attained and sustained employment.

Lo and behold, I found out that even though he attained employment, he encountered increased discrimination and issues at the workplace. That made me shift my strategy, incorporating more workplace advocacy, employer education, and accommodation.

This process also learned that assessment is not a fixed process: it's listening, thinking, and making sure the client needs are adequately addressed.

Assessing Family Interventions: A comparison of stability and well-being.

At New Hope Housing, I also worked with homeless families in crisis and offered them case management and housing assistance. The most poignant case that I read was of a woman with two children who were made homeless after they were evicted from their residence for the reason of lack of funds.

First, my attention was on:

• To get her set up with emergency housing and financial support.

• To obtain her connected to job services that would increase her earnings.

• To have her children go to school and a mental health counselor.

To see if they did or did not work, I:
 

Evaluated housing stability: Did the family actually get to transition from shelter to permanent housing?

• Assessed financial well-being: Had she secured a stable job and good income?

• Assessed family well-being: Did children's school attendance and mental health improve for the better?

By this assessment, I came to know that even though the mother had been provided with a place of shelter, she was not financially stable. This made me shift my strategy and head towards long-term financial planning, debt elimination, and ongoing case management.

This case has also demonstrated that it is not only for the current outcomes but also for the future outlook.

Evaluating Group Interventions: Effectiveness and rate of participation

I co-led a self-advocacy group for individuals with disabilities at ECNV.  To ensure the effectiveness of the group I:

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• Collected feedback from the participants through group discussions and questionnaires.

• Track frequency of attendance and level of participation.

• Pre- and post-participation self-assessment of advocacy skills confidence levels.

The assessment justified that the majority of the participants were confident. However, some stated that the absence of means of transport had an effect on their attendance. So, we were compelled to employ online meetings, which not only made the group convenient but also responsive.

Similarly, at New Hope Housing, I assisted in conducting life skills classes with the individuals who otherwise would have no other place to live. Through assessing:

• Retention of knowledge through pre- and post-test.
• Capacity to engage in using new money and knowledge of tenant rights.
• Long-term stability following the workshop.

To observe what the most beneficial subjects were and where intervention needs to be made.

During the course of the presentation, I included that group interventions should be frequent and shifts should be introduced to increase group productivity.

Assessment of Community and Organizational Interventions: Towards structural change.

Throughout work at New Hope Housing, I conducted the community assessment towards the strengthening of the housing services. I did the following:

• Collected data on evictions and barriers to affordable housing.

• Conducted the gaps in existing housing programs.

• Consulted with policymakers to submit recommendations based on the data examined.

Similarly, throughout work at ECNV, I examined the disability rights policies, including:

• The efficiency of neighborhood accessibility initiatives.

• Client problems despite policy implementation.

• How to make policies more effective and how to improve advocacy.

These experiences correspond to Competency 5 (Policy Practice) since they refer to the manner in which the analysis of systemic interventions influences the process of policy and program development.

Bridging Evaluation with Research and Ethical Practice.

The GMU program allowed me to apply the research-evident evaluation processes in the field. The Council on Social Work Education 2022 EPAS standards have provided that the evaluations must be:

• Adherent to ethics, non-discriminatory, and culturally safe.

• Quantitative and qualitative data must be utilized in assessing effectiveness.

Client-centered, where the voice of people and communities is utilized in bringing about changes.

The NASW Code of Ethics also notes that assessment must be undertaken in a fashion that adheres to ethical values including:

• Accountability and transparency to educate clients about how they are being evaluated.

• Strengths based, empowering rather than deficits.

• Learning professionals, employing assessment as a tool for development.

These guidelines, I believe, assisted me in making proper, thoughtful, genuine, reasonable, and rightful judgments during my practice.

Conclusion: The importance of assessment in Social Work.

My belief is that evaluation is not just measuring effectiveness but also the process of making the process more effective, efficient, and precise. During my practice at ECNV and New Hope Housing, I have realized that effective evaluation is:

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• Continuous improvement and reorientation to meet the constantly evolving needs of the clients.

• Involvement of clients includes utilization of the clients' experiences and feedback.

• Policy and research, to inform changes made on evidence.

• Respectful and ethical approaches, human and respecting the experiences of the people being served.

In seeking to advance my social work profession, I will:

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• To assess the interventions to improve them and make them better.

• To ensure that the client has a voice in enhancing practice.

• To assist in research and policy that can improve social services.

My field experience has reaffirmed that social work is not just offering a helping hand but making sure that the help offered is meaningful, and results in change. Therefore, there is a need to evaluate a process so that better services can be offered to the populations of concern, including individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities so that social work interventions are most effective.