The Caribbean region is subdivided into English-, Dutch-, Spanish- and French-speaking territories as a result of their history of colonisation. Due to this divide, there is little consensus and holistic identity about the Caribbean in terms of history, problems, resources, policies, and programs and this has influenced social work education as it developed in the countries of the region (Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). The social work programs as they evolve are not homogenous and the English-, Dutch-, French- and Spanish-speaking countries all have different approaches to the delivery of social work education. Some programs adopt a North American approach to training but ensure that Caribbean content is infused in the curriculum while others have a predominantly European orientation. The European orientation is particularly noticeable in the programs that are delivered in countries that have remained territories of European countries. For example, social work education as offered in the Dutch-speaking Caribbean countries of Aruba and Curacao is still influenced by the philosophy surrounding social work education in the Netherlands. Thus, it is not very compatible with local needs. However, the local faculty have recognised a need to move away from a Eurocentric approach to practice to a greater Caribbean slant and as a result the universities in these Dutch territories are trying to make their social work programs more culturally relevant by adding Caribbean content into the social work curriculum (Baker & Maxwell 2012).

This chapter provides an overview of the past and current delivery of social work education in the English-speaking Caribbean. It will discuss the programs and the methods presently used in preparing students for practice. The status of social work education vis-a-vis educational programs in the allied professions, the internationalisation of the curriculum and the use of the Global Standards in program and curriculum development will be included in the discussion. The programs offered by The University of the West Indies will be used as the specific point of reference.

Before 1838 (emancipation of the slaves), social welfare services were virtually non-existent in the British Caribbean colonies because of the nature of the slave plantation economy. Little provision was made for the wellbeing of the ex-slaves following emancipation and over time the sociopolitical conditions of the masses in the British colonies became so dire that it led them to revolt in 1937 (Augier et al. 1970). The British Government investigated the cause of the unrest in its colonies through the Moyne Commission in 1938. Following the investigation, a report was written known as the Moyne Report (Maxwell 2002). Based on the recommendations of the report, the British Government passed a Colonial Development and Welfare Act in 1940 which established a Colonial Development and Welfare Fund. Funding for social programs in the colonies was provided from this fund through the Colonial Development and Welfare Office in Britain (Augier et al. 1970). This assistance by the British Government in the early 1940s led to the development of social welfare systems and the introduction of social work in the region. Thus, it can be said that social welfare services in the British West Indies developed as a mandate of the British Colonial and Welfare Office (Maxwell 2002; Dolly-Besson et al. 1983), out of a need for social and economic justice and to meet the welfare needs of the poor and disadvantaged. Social welfare agencies were set up in some colonies including Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad. Persons were appointed as social welfare officers and sent to universities such as Swansea, the London School of Economic and the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom for professional social work training (Maxwell et al. 2003; Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). A decade later it was documented in a Colonial Development and Welfare Report that ‘the climate of public opinion in the West Indies has changed, and there is more acceptance of the need for skilled professional direction of social work’ (Colonial Development and Welfare Report 1953 as cited in Maxwell 2002). These early services were delivered using the welfare model and the casework approach to practice in countries such as Barbados and Trinidad (Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). In Jamaica, ‘the emphasis was on community development’ (Dolly-Besson et al. 1983, 3). The casework approach was passed down through the years but social work education in the Caribbean has been trying to move practitioners away from this old method of social work intervention which tends to encourage client dependency, to a more dynamic, pragmatic, developmental and empowering approach to helping through a focus on ecological and empowerment theories and the strengths perspective.

Maxwell (2002) gives an excellent account of the development of social work in the English-speaking Caribbean. He maps the transition from the pre-20th century colonial era through the post-1938 (World War 2) period to the end of the 20th century. He highlights the provision of state sponsored poor relief that catered to the basic needs of people through a welfare model and makes reference to the employment of the first social welfare officers in the region. He mentions the early initiatives that were undertaken to professionalise social services in the region. These included professional training for the newly appointed social welfare officers in the 1940s and 1950s ‘to perform as multifunctional social work practitioners’ (19), and the streamlining of the social services to serve the needs of a varied clientele. He also briefly notes the measures that were taken over the years ‘to provide training and professional education for the social workers staffing the various service agencies’ (29). These included the development of the two year professional certificate program offered by the University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona in 1961 and the expansion of social work education across the region to the University of Guyana in 1970 and to two other campuses of UWI, the Cave Hill and St Augustine Campuses in 1988 and 1990 respectively. Maxwell (2002) also acknowledges the role of various non-governmental organisations in the development of social work and social welfare services in the English-speaking Caribbean in the first part of the 20th century and describes the growth of the government social services sector in countries of the region during the latter part of the century.

The history of social work and social work education in the English-speaking Caribbean is still being written but much has been documented by Caribbean scholars (Rock 2013; Baker & Maxwell 2012; Watkins & Holder-Dolly 2012; Rock 2011; Nettleford 2005; Maxwell et al. 2003; Maxwell 2002; Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). ‘These scholars agree that formal social work education was started in the English-speaking Caribbean in 1961 when a two-year professional certificate course was introduced at the Mona Campus’ (Rock 2013, 735). This program later developed into a full-fledged three year baccalaureate program in 1970 (Maxwell et al. 2003; Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). Today the Mona Campus also offers the MSW which was started in 1993. The second oldest program in the English-speaking Caribbean was started in 1963 by the UWI Social Welfare Training Centre in Jamaica. This developed into a four-month certificate course in social work for paraprofessionals. This program still exists today and brings together students from all over the Caribbean to train in Jamaica. Over the last three decades several other tertiary-level institutions in the Caribbean also began to offer social work programs either at the certificate, diploma or degree level. However, none of these programs are offered through schools or departments of social work. They are located in college or university departments which also offer programs in other disciplines such as political science, psychology and sociology. This presents challenges for the social work programs as they have to compete for the scarce resources available in the departments (Maxwell et al. 2003).

Context and philosophical underpinnings of social work education in the Caribbean

Social work services in the Caribbean have been growing in response to the varied social needs of the people and social work education is increasingly being seen as critical to enable the preparation of social workers for professional practice with vulnerable populations. In 2013 there are over 18 tertiary-level institutions in over 19 countries in the Caribbean region which have taken on the mandate of offering social work training. Five of these programs are located in Jamaica, four in Trinidad and Tobago and two in Barbados. With the introduction of online social work programs by UWI Open Campus in 2009, persons in 17 Eastern Caribbean countries can also have access to social work education. The programs offer various qualifications. These include the certificate in social work, the associate degree in social work, the baccalaureate and master degree and the PhD degree which is offered by two of the programs. The baccalaureate degree (BSc and not BSW) is the most common qualification offered (Baker & Maxwell 2012, 385). The certificate programs are often year long and are geared towards meeting the educational needs of paraprofessionals engaged in social work related duties. The diploma and associate degree programs are generally two years in duration and the baccalaureate programs are three years in duration if undertaken on a full-time basis. There are a few programs which offer introductory (4–6 months) certificate courses and 12 month diploma programs.

The institutions that offer social work programs in the Dutch and English-speaking Caribbean include the four campuses of the University of the West Indies (Cave Hill Campus, Barbados; Mona Campus, Jamaica; St Augustine Campus, Trinidad and Tobago; and the Open Campus), Northern Caribbean University (Jamaica), the University of the Southern Caribbean (Trinidad and Tobago), the University College of Trinidad and Tobago; the University College of the Bahamas, Barbados Community College, The Sir Arthur Lewis Community College, St Lucia, the University of Aruba, University of the Netherland Antilles (Curacao), the University of Guyana, The International University of the Caribbean (St Kitts and Nevis), Jamaica Theological Seminary, Montego Bay Community College (Jamaica), TA Marryshaw Community College (Grenada), the University of Belize, the Caribbean Nazarene College (Jamaica) and the College of Science, Technology and Applied Arts of Trinidad and Tobago (COSTAATT). The philosophical approach to the delivery of social work education as well as the curricula content of these programs differ and there are efforts by the Association of Caribbean Social Work Educators (ACSWE) to get the programs to use the Global Standards as a way of ensuring that they use basic international guidelines in the planning and delivery of social work education. The programs delivered by the four campuses of UWI are harmonised to some degree to facilitate the transfer of students from one program to another if they so desire.

At the inception of the certificate program in social work at the Mona Campus in 1961, the countries of the English-speaking Caribbean were colonies of Britain and this early course was patterned to a large extent after existing programs in social administration at universities in the UK (Watkins & Holder Dolly 2012; Maxwell et al. 2003; Dolly-Besson et al. 1983). When the Mona baccalaureate program was instituted in 1970 it also had a British orientation but ‘there was a significant modification of the program in the mid-1970s bringing it more in line with the professional requirements in North America and Britain’ (Maxwell et al. 2003, 13). As other programs emerged in the English-speaking Caribbean, they gravitated towards the North American approach to the preparation of students, not only because they tended to adopt the Mona model but because some of the faculty members had received their professional training in North America (Maxwell et al. 2003). Additionally, because of the dearth of Caribbean social work literature for teaching, the books and much of the materials used in the programs were authored by North American and European scholars. A decade ago Maxwell et al. (2003) cited this as a matter for concern and challenged faculty members to increase their research output as a way of producing indigenous theories and textbooks. However, the situation still exists and the lack of local empirical literature presents some epistemological challenges for the programs since students receive little grounding in the theory and concepts of the Caribbean reality that would enable them to have a greater understanding of the problems that exists in their own locales. However, it must be emphasised that Caribbean thought and experiences are being increasingly infused into the curriculum with the understanding that there are cultural considerations and challenges to fully adopting non-Caribbean paradigms and models of practice.

It should be noted, however, that a number of Caribbean social work scholars, including faculty of the University of the West Indies, have produced some excellent publications against the odds. Some have written chapters in edited social work text books and articles in journals which are disseminated internationally and there are manuals and other materials with a Caribbean focus that are produced by local social work faculty. The Association of Caribbean Social Work Educators (ACSWE) has provided two vehicles for Caribbean social work colleagues to share their research and scholarship. These are the Biennial Social Work Educators’ Conference and the Caribbean Journal of Social Work, a peer-reviewed journal that was initially funded by a grant from the International Association of Schools of Social Work (IASSW) and the University of Connecticut, School of Social Work, US. The journal has been published since 2002 and has become a useful medium for the dissemination of indigenous social work research and other scholarly writing with a Caribbean focus (Rock 2013). However, the rallying call for Caribbean social work faculty to pursue a program of culturally relevant social work research to guide policy and build models of intervention that can fully inform practice with Caribbean populations (Maxwell et al. 2003; Rock & Valtonen 2002) still remains. A major obstacle is that the programs in the region have a small number of social work faculty members who are burdened with many teaching and related responsibilities which afford them little opportunity to engage in scholarly research and writing.

Delivery of social work education

Within UWI, social work education is delivered mainly by faculty who hold qualifications in social work. There are some PhD trained faculty but most people hold the MSW as their most advanced qualification. There is a general understanding and appreciation of the skills and knowledge base required to be a social work educator and this is considered when hiring new social work faculty members who usually have a wealth of on-the-ground experience of different kinds, which underpins their teaching. However, non-UWI programs do not follow this requirement and will employ faculty who hold a BSc and/or master’s degree in psychology, in counselling or a related discipline. Thus, without a social work qualification or social work experience, people are hired as faculty to teach social work. This compromises the standards of the profession. It is a very troubling issue, and so there needs to be consensus among programs in the region about the skill set and knowledge base required for teaching in the discipline. Today many of the social work lecturers who are employed in the regional institutions have been trained in North America or the Caribbean and to a lesser extent in Europe.

An important task for ACSWE is to establish that social work education which involves students in an internship in a social service setting is the professional training for social workers. Although the length of classroom instruction and the duration of the internship may differ according to the course of study being undertaken, the internship is a most critical component of social work training. ACSWE also needs to encourage institutions that offer social work programs to use the Global Standards for the Education and Training of the Social Work Profession (www.iassw-aiets.org/global-standards-for-social-work-education-and-training ‘the Global Standards’) as a guide for program development, employment of staff, recruitment of students, and the organisation, administration and governance of the program. Advocacy regarding licensing and registration of social workers in the Caribbean must become the mission of trained social workers in the region.

The general aims of the social work programs offered by UWI are: (1) to create a cadre of social work trained professionals suitably qualified to intervene in the lives of persons who are vulnerable and at-risk, to motivate, empower and help these individuals lead fulfilled lives; and (2) to produce graduates who are mature, work ready, attuned to clients, who have the ability to advocate on behalf of persons for social and economic justice and who understand the nature of national, regional and global social problems. The missions of the social work programs tend to be aligned with the mission of their institutions. Although the syllabi are designed to a large extent to reflect the Caribbean reality, they also incorporate a global perspective. The curricula of the programs do vary based on the level of the qualification being offered but a generalist approach is usually adopted at the undergraduate level. The generalist approach to practice focuses on the empowerment of clients and knowledge is grounded in the strengths perspective, systems theory and ecological theory. Psychological theories are also incorporated where applicable. This generic approach to preparing students to work with individuals, families, groups and communities is useful as it exposes students to all levels of practice – micro, meso, and macro – and helps to position young graduates for the social work job market. It also equips them in a singular way to work within the local social service system, as they acquire broad skills for networking and collaborating across different areas of the human services.

The curricula of the undergraduate programs include courses in social work, psychology and sociology and core courses in social work ethics, counselling, developmental and abnormal psychology, social research and statistics, work with individuals and families, group work theory and practice, community organisation, social work administration, social policy, and human behaviour or at least some variation of these. Apart from the core social work theory and practice courses, students usually have access to a wide range of electives. These will vary from program to program but may include courses in ‘crisis intervention and areas relevant to special population groups, such as abused and neglected children, the elderly, disabled, substance abusers and persons affected by and infected with HIV/AIDS. Students may also take advantage of electives offered in other disciplines’ (Rock 2013, 738). This approach to training is necessary because in recent times the bachelor level graduate in the region is being sought to fill roles in many sectors such as HIV/AIDS, trauma and grief counselling, domestic violence intervention, child abuse prevention, and substance abuse management. As graduate education expands in the region, some of the jobs in these niche areas are being filled by MSW graduates.

‘At both the undergraduate and graduate levels the social work course content is infused with modules on the history of the profession, human rights, social and economic justice, social work principles, values and ethics’ (Rock 2013, 737). The coordinators of the programs are also encouraged to periodically renew their curricula to keep them current.

The supervised internship (practicum) in a social service agency is an important part of the social work curriculum in all programs and at all levels of certification. The structure of this practicum may vary across programs. For example, ‘the curriculum of the current B.Sc. Social Work program at The University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus in Barbados combines two years of classroom coursework and one year of field instruction’ (Rock & Ring 2010) while the Mona and St Augustine campuses deliver a concurrent placement. The length of the placement (hours of work in the agency) usually varies according to the level of training – certificate versus degree. What is common is the intensive exposure of the student on internship to work with vulnerable populations and in areas such as probation and correctional services, child services, welfare and social service programs, substance abuse management, victim support, community development, HIV/AIDS, clinical services (hospital and mental health), social service administration and management, and school social work, among others. The Global Standards state that ‘field education should be sufficient in duration and complexity of tasks and learning opportunities to ensure that students are prepared for practice’ (Sewpaul & Jones 2004) and also that ‘issues regarding cultural and ethnic diversity, and gender analysis are to be represented in the fieldwork component of the program’ (10).

The internship is generally supervised by a trained faculty member and/or field placement coordinator and in each agency by an agency supervisor who is suitably qualified to support the student and provide practice guidance in the agency. However, due to the limited number of openings for internships in traditional social work agencies, students may be placed in non-traditional settings where there may not be suitably qualified practicing social workers to supervise the student. In such cases the practicum coordinator provides direct supervision to the student. The internship affords students the opportunity to engage clients in the agency setting and to ‘integrate the theory learned in the classroom with practice’ (Rock & Ring 2010, 177). A strong component of this internship at UWI is a weekly Field Integrative Seminar which allows students to process and assess their level of engagement in the agency, their success in applying the theory learned in the classroom to their work with clients, their own suitability for the social work profession, and benefit from peer support. As social work and psychology programs have increased in the region and as the number of students in these disciplines has grown, there is an increasing demand for supervised internships for students in social service agencies. In small countries such as Barbados this has led to great difficulty in procuring agency placements and created a need for social work students and faculty to look beyond the borders of their own country and be prepared to engage in internships in other countries of the region or internationally.

Graduate social work education is delivered mainly by the three UWI Campuses, Mona, Cave Hill and St Augustine. Graduate students are given the opportunity to pursue the MSW in clinical social work, administration and management, community and policy practice or HIV/AIDS (Baker & Maxwell 2012). A master’s degree in mediation studies is also delivered under the auspices of the Social Work program at the St Augustine Campus. New MSW programs are beginning to emerge as other universities in the region are getting involved in graduate social work education.

The internationalisation of social work education

Social work programs in the English-speaking Caribbean are placing great importance on cultural relevance and working with diversity. The UWI endeavours to ensure cultural relevance and reliability by including information about the local peoples’ beliefs, customs and general way of life in the social work curriculum. The Caribbean has a mix of peoples, and although most persons are of African descent, there are various ethnic groupings and indigenous populations (Baker & Maxwell 2012) and therefore social workers must be appropriately trained to work with the local populations and with cultural sensitivity. Knowledge of the local scene and cultural underpinnings in client case management, community engagement, clinical practice in hospitals, schools and other settings is essential for the social worker. This is supported by Dominelli (2012) who states that ‘emphasis on the local is important because this is the space where everyday life practices occur’ (45). However, Healy (2002) notes that while working in their own countries, social workers also need to know how global issues impact their various clients, their agencies and others around them and how to deal with others who come to their countries. She also states that the practitioner comes into contact periodically with situations that require knowledge beyond the borders of his/her own country and that ‘social work programs should prepare students to understand and address the local manifestations of global problems’ (4). Furthermore, the local social work programs ‘exist within institutions and communities that are trying to survive in the turbulent, global environment and this in itself creates a tremendous impact on the profession’ (Rock 2013, 738) as it develops in the region.

Internationalisation and globalisation are terms used frequently in reference to social work education and practice. In social work education internationalisation may be introduced via the curriculum. Dominelli (2012) defines internationalisation as ‘those processes whereby people interact across national borders, cultures, traditions, and everyday life routines through organisations that link the local with the global and vice-versa to promote human wellbeing through egalitarian practices’ (45). There are a variety of models and possibilities when internationalising the social work curriculum (Hokenstad 2012; Healy 2012), and social work programs in the English-speaking Caribbean have approached the internationalisation of their curricula in different ways. For example, the practice models and perspectives used in the programs in the English-speaking Caribbean are of North American and/or Eurocentric origins and therefore strongly influence the delivery of social work education in the region. Additionally, international content is purposefully infused into the curriculum and students and staff are afforded opportunities for exchange and engagement to share best practices and knowledge of what is happening in the profession globally so as to maintain a global reach in the programs. Students and faculty also participate in international exchanges. Living in a global world is a factor that is increasingly emphasised through courses that include content on global development and global social issues, global models of practice and international case studies. A focus on human rights also engages students in the Caribbean in discussion on the UN international conventions and treaties.

Caribbean programs have a history of training students to work not only in their own countries and throughout the region but internationally on graduation. Apart from classroom instruction the campuses of UWI make gallant efforts to prepare students for the global marketplace including through international linkages. Many Caribbean families also have ties with relatives who have migrated and so the Caribbean social work graduate is also increasingly migrating in search of work or further study. These graduates are often recruited by agencies abroad and they need to be able to make the transition (Rock 2013). Some agencies in countries such as the US, UK, and Canada may require Caribbean graduates to pursue short courses in order to become registered and gain license to practice in their country but this is not considered a barrier. The Caribbean and International Social Work Conferences which are held in the Caribbean biennially, and the agreements and memoranda of understanding (MOUs) that are signed with other international universities and which facilitate international student and faculty exchanges also promote the internationalisation of Caribbean programs (Rock 2011). Students from the Mona, Cave Hill and St Augustine campuses participate in international exchange programs annually. Social work educators must be aware that, in whichever part of the globe they work, their students need exposure to the world view.

Some Caribbean social work programs and by extension their faculty are members of IASSW and the North American and Caribbean Association of Schools of Social Work (NACASSW). The Cave Hill program was involved in a global group work project with international partners and the International Association of Social Work with Groups. Membership in these bodies and the presentations made by faculty from the Caribbean in International conferences, meetings and seminars foster international visibility, allow persons from the region to make a contribution to social work education at the international level and contribute to the transfer of information.

The Global Standards for Education and Training of the Social Work Profession

‘The purpose of social work is to promote human wellbeing, human rights and social justice, with special attention to those who are marginalised by society, experiencing oppression, poverty or disability’ (Huxtable et al. 2012, 232). The Global Standards which were adopted by IASSW and IFSW in 2004 and made available via their websites to social workers around the world promote the purpose of social work. These standards constitute guidelines for program development and are basically the ideals to which social workers and social work programs may aspire as they work towards enhancing their approach to the profession.

The social work programs in the Caribbean have been made aware of the Global Standards through various media including the IFSW (www.ifsw.org) and IASSW (www.iassw-aiets.org) websites and ACSWE. However, there is no empirical evidence that the programs, apart from those offered on the UWI campuses, have used these standards as a framework in the development of their programs or in the renewal of their curricula. The UWI programs are subject to a quality assurance review every five years and in 2006 one of the recommendations of the Social Work Self-Assessment Team for the Cave Hill Campus was that the Global Standards be shared with and reviewed by the campus administration as a way of gaining support for needed resources for program development. In the review of the social work program of the St Augustine Campus in 2011, ’the transferability between countries of quality standards for both teaching and research’ (Taylor & Rock 2011, 365) was discussed. The UWI programs have therefore sought to use the standards as guidelines to help ensure that their programs are of a sufficient standard and quality that students are adequately prepared for professional practice. Careful thought is given by faculty to the core curriculum of their program and the Global Standards which address the ‘domain of social work’, the ‘domain of the social worker’, ‘methods of social work practice’, and the ‘paradigm of the profession’ provide useful information. Objectives with regards to cultural and ethnic diversity, and gender analysis, social work values and ethics and human rights are also incorporated into the curricula as suggested in the Global Standards. The Global Standards have proven to be most useful as a point of reference and to bring added credibility to small social work programs which are being delivered in small island developing states.

Conclusions

Today, almost 73 years after the recommendations of the Moyne Report, and 52 years since the first social work education program was offered at the Mona Campus, there are numerous ‘state-sponsored social services created along the lines of the welfare systems found in the former or current colonial states’ (Baker & Maxwell 2012, 384) throughout the Caribbean. There are also several social work education programs that are being offered by tertiary institutions. However, despite this growth in services and programs, the social work profession is still fighting for recognition in the Caribbean as many persons including politicians equate charity and voluntarism with professional social work. In fact the mindset of many persons is that the church welfare worker and other ‘do-gooders’ who provide assistance to the poor are social workers. This has caused some problems for the profession since social service agencies continue to hire non-social work trained personnel to perform social work duties and bachelor level trained psychology and sociology graduates are employed as social workers. While it may be useful to employ persons in allied fields to perform social work related duties in countries of the region where there are not enough professionally trained social workers, this practice is unacceptable in those places where programs are graduating social workers on an annual basis. The local professional associations often make a response to this practice as they seek to establish that social work is a profession in its own right. In Barbados the professional association has worked with government to establish various categories for the employment of persons who perform social work or social work related duties in government social service agencies. The same is true for the Jamaica Association of Social Workers (JASW www.gojasw.org) which launched the new code of ethics (gojasw.org/wp-content/uploads/213/12/COE1.pdf) for Jamaican professional social workers and allied professionals last year (June 2012). This group is now assiduously pursuing licensing and registration of its members. Although social workers are recognised for their work with vulnerable populations and their role in the creation of social policies to address social issues, they need to be licensed and registered to uphold their unique professional status.

In social work education the responsibility is to continue to train persons to the highest level in the profession and maintain accreditation of programs. This includes the delivery of quality postgraduate education (MSW and PhD) and continuing education for social work practitioners and supervisors. Thus far, there are only a few universities in the region including three of the UWI campuses which offer MSW and PhD social work programs in social work. It can be said that UWI is leading in postgraduate social work education (Baker & Maxwell 2012). Many of the other programs, although not yet ready to offer graduate level training in social work, also need to aspire to offer graduate education so that more students can study to the highest level in the profession without having to go abroad. It is also necessary for coordinators of the social work programs in the region to meet periodically to review their curricula so that programs benefit from new trends and insights and seek ways to address the regional and global demands impacting the profession as well as the emerging social issues in the region. The programs also need to work towards professional accreditation and the professional associations toward the licensing and registration of social workers in the Caribbean. Much of this is a work in progress but it will determine how and when social work will achieve professional recognition throughout the Caribbean region.

Social work in the English-speaking Caribbean emerged out of a need for equality and social justice for the people of the region. Today the programs are being encouraged to adopt a rights-based approach to practice as they intervene with individuals, families, groups and communities. The quest for social justice is critical and must affect legislation, policy and program organisation. The global agenda on social work and social development (www.iassw-aiets.org/global-agenda) challenges social workers globally to commit to a number of agenda action items including the ‘promotion of social and economic equalities’.

Social work education in the Caribbean is advancing amid the challenges which include limited financial resources to deliver programs and fund research activity, a paucity of local empirical research to drive the development of indigenous theories, a limited number of professionally trained agency supervisors to supervise students on internships, few faculty members holding the PhD qualification, scarcity of social work jobs for graduates and the employment of non-social work personnel to perform social work duties in social agencies, the perceived low status of the profession, the lack of licensing and registration of social workers and the lack of an accreditation system for programs (Rock 2013; Watkins & Holder Dolly 2012).

References