The School of Social Work prepares highly competent, effective, and ethical social work professionals to serve diverse, vulnerable, and impoverished populations.  Through our educational programs we dedicate ourselves to the instruction, development, and dissemination of evidence-informed knowledge and skills to advance contemporary and future social work practice.  We are bound by a professional code of ethics (https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics/Code-of-Ethics) and ask applicants to read the code of ethics before developing this letter of intent.  The letter of intent is a critical part of the application. It is the first writing sample an applicant submits to the faculty. Reviewers will consider both the content and writing skills of the letter of intent.

Respond to each area listed below in paragraph format.  The length of your letter of intent should be approximately 2-4 typed and double-spaced pages, not to exceed four.  Your name should appear in the upper right hand corner of each page.

I.            What is your understanding of the social work profession?

II.            Career Goals
What interested you in pursuing social work as a profession?
How did this interest develop?
In what special fields of social work do you have an interest?
If you trained for or worked in another field, why are you proposing to get a social work degree?

III.          Life Experiences Related to Social Work
Social work requires working with people of diversified backgrounds with varied problems and the capacity for understanding and helping people.  What experiences have you had in working with people of diversified backgrounds and how would these experiences help you work with people of diversified backgrounds?
In what other ways have your experiences contributed to your interest in social work?  Describe experiences in family relationships, group relationships, work, volunteer, recreational activities, etc., which you think affect your potential for social work.
What are your strengths, as you perceive them, which you think will stand you in good stead as a social worker?
What professional areas do you target for growth as you engage in social work?

IV.          Graduate School Readiness

Graduate School is time consuming and academically challenging. How do you plan to balance the demands of your personal life with the academic demands of graduate school ?

All MSW programs require experiential learning though field education courses that take place in an agency setting as an integral part of social work education.  Due to the experiential nature and supervision requirements, field education courses will be completed in an agency setting during normal business hours to provide an opportunity to develop competencies in areas prescribed by the Council on Social Work Education educational standards (evenings and weekends are the exception). This is often challenging for part-time, online students or students trying to work full-time.  Please describe your plan to be available to intern in the agency during normal business hours to ensure field is a successful part of your educational experience.

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