Jerome Cohen

Selected Constraints in the Relationship between Social Work Education and Practice

Abstract The gap between graduate social work education and practice has long been identified as an issue of concern to both groups as well as to the professional organizations with which they are affiliated. In the past decade the gap has widened and become of sufficient magnitude to warrant action so that the relationship between the two can be enhanced. This paper highlights some of the critical issues identified by both practitioners and educators.

CUSTOMS, COUPLING, AND THE FAMILY IN A CHANGING CULTURE

Rapid change in social customs with respect to sexual relations and family structure has accentuated the problem of differential diagnosis. This paper considers the difficulties in distinguishing those forms of behavioral that represent healthy exploration in the service of coping with social change from those that represent individual pathology masked by social change. Case examples illustrative of this contemporary clinical dilemma are offered.

Book Review: Consultation in Social WorkConsultation in Social Work. By KadushinAlfred. New York: Columbia University Press, 1977.

the much-needed further research in this area must still try to determine on an idiosyncratic basis the best way to relate these various helping models to the needs of individual service consumers. The book suggests two critical research needs. First, the different organizational models utilized by self-help groups need to be explored more thoroughly. A better understanding of these structures may lead not only to knowledge about why some self-help groups are more or less successful over time, but also to possible modification of formal service organizations, making them more responsive to client need. Second, the ways in which current social policies facilitate or hinder the development of self-help groups needs to be examined. For example, demands for fiscal accountability has severely limited the success of self-help groups in securing financial support from public and voluntary funding bodies. Similiarly, professional certification requirements and statutory regulations regarding professional activities may inhibit development of the necessary partnership between formal service providers and self-help groups. Gartner and Riessmans book is a first step in providing the groundwork for the attainment of these future objectives. Moreover, it serves an important function in drawing the attention of more professional social workers to the growing significance of the self-help phenomenon. One only wishes that they had been able to carry their analysis a little further and to support their theoretical formulations by firmer research data. It is to be hoped that the authors also view this work as a first effort and that they will use the National Self-Help Clearinghouse they recently established in New York to help build the knowledge base needed by society in this field.