Ecological Justice: Creating a New MSW Concentration for a Healthy, Thriving, and Regenerative World

Overview: This poster describes the creation, launch, and curriculum of a new MSW concentration in Ecological Justice, the first of its kind in the U.S. Through holistic, innovative, and interdisciplinary training, social work graduates are prepared to confront the climate crisis, pollution, natural resource loss, and other forms of ecological injustice.Proposal text: Since the 1980s, environmental justice has grown as a social justice movement in the U.S., and one especially focused on environmental racism and the human right to a healthy environment (McGurty, 1997). Social work organizations and initiatives, including the Council on Social Work Education (2015), Grand Challenges for Social Work (Kemp, Palinkas, & Mason, 2018), and International Federation of Social Workers (Truell & Jones, 2012) now recognize environmental justice as integral to the profession.

As social work programs adapt and innovate to integrate environmental justice in their offerings (e.g., Boetto & Bell, 2015), important curriculum questions arise: What content or courses should programs add? What could a concentration in this look like? What institutional barriers to change may arise?

Through this poster presentation, attendees will learn about the creation, launch, and curriculum of a new MSW concentration in Ecological Justice, the first of its kind in the U.S. The poster format will provide time for individualized and in-depth conversation about the new concentration, how it was developed and approved, and how attendees might pursue similar curricular innovation at their own programs.

Key to the new concentration, the concept of ecological justice builds upon environmental justice by expanding the focus from justice that is primarily only for people, to justice for people, other species, and entire ecosystems. This concept is innovative and also inclusive of Indigenous knowledge and practices about the intricate interconnections among people and all living and non-living things (Billiot, Beltrán, Brown, Mitchell, & Fernandez, 2019). This focus aligns well with the conference theme of global rights, as inclusive of humans and the other species with which we co-exist.

References

Billiot, S., Beltrán, R., Brown, D., Mitchell, F. M., & Fernandez, A. (2019). Indigenous perspectives for strengthening social responses to global environmental changes: A response to the social work grand challenge on environmental change. Journal of Community Practice, 27(3-4), 296-316.

Boetto, H., & Bell, K. (2015). Environmental sustainability in social work education: An online initiative to encourage global citizenship. International Social Work, 58(3), 448–462.

Council on Social Work Education (2015). 2015 Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards for Baccalaureate and Master’s Social Work Programs. Alexandria, VA: Author

Kemp, S. P., Palinkas, L. A., & Mason, L. R. (2018). Responding to global environmental change: A grand challenge for social work. In R. Fong, J. Lubben, & R. Barth (Eds.), Grand challenges for social work and society: Social progress powered by science (pp. 140–160). Oxford University Press.

McGurty, M. M. (1997). From NIMBY to civil rights: The origins of the environmental justice movement. Environmental History, 2, 301–323.

Truell, R., & Jones, D. N. (2012). The global agenda for social work and social development: Extending the influence of social work. Rheinfelden, Switzerland: International Federation of Social Workers. Retrieved from: http://cdn.ifsw.org/assets/ifsw_24848-10.pdf