LIONGSON, Pent Elyria Dawn V. Professor Edna Julia V.

Cunanan
BSSW SW205: Social Work Practice with Individuals and Families
8:00AM-11:00AM/Saturday

The Social Case Work Towards In-depth Helping

A Reflection Paper in lieu of Absence on August 31, 2019

There is a wide array of methods a social worker can choose to specialize in. There is group work
wherein a worker may maximize skills in promoting interaction and intermixing between
individuals who join as members. We also have community organization wherein a worker will
put efforts directed towards meeting the community needs by organizing human and material
resources of the community. There also is social research helping professional social workers to
describe, define, measure and evaluate their work. Also among the methods is social welfare
administration which deals with areas of management and human relations in the social work
arena. However, the question is, how will a worker be a master of any of those without fully
comprehending and appropriately use the case work? How can one social worker explore other
techniques if he or she lack skills in case work? The way I see it is that it’s impossible because all
the techniques would, at one point or more, would still go back to case work. In line with this, the
present paper will be my attempt to express my reflections and insights on social case work as I
think the most popular technique yet inappropriately used in the helping process.

Thelma Lee-Mendoza defined social case work as the art of changing human attitudes. Lee-
Mendoza pointed out that social case work means social treatment of a maladjusted individual
involving an attempt to understand his/her personality, behavior and social relationships and to
assist him/her in working out a better social and personal adjustment. This, therefore, means that
through case work, one of the primary concerns of the worker is on helping the client toward social
functioning. In doing so, a social worker should have broad understanding of the perspective of
person-in-environment (PIE) that highlights the importance of knowing an individual and
individual behavior in light of the environmental contexts in which that person lives and acts.

Social workers’ efforts are aimed at changing the nature of the person-situation interaction. Given
this, I can’t help remembering stories I share with my former social worker colleagues who happen
to display ideals that are against the principles of social work let alone social case work. Before I
enrolled myself in the BS Social Work program, I witnessed several malpractices done in case
work that included questioning the client’s capability to change, shouting at clients,
underestimating their educational status and non-prioritization. Even back then I don’t have much
knowledge of social work, I know that those are already violation of person’s self-worth and
integrity. They should be, at all of people know the situation of the client. Case work requires
carefulness on the part of the worker because his or her actions will affect the helping process in
either good or bad way. They should maximize the trust given by the client by demonstrating
acceptance, individualization and self-awareness—which I think we’re not always given emphasis
probably because of the large number of caseload a typical social worker manages. The social
worker’s job assignment involves mediating (Schwartz) or matching (Gordon), or striking a
balance between peoples coping ability and situational/environmental demands (Bartlett) and
should not be imposer shortcomings and deviation of the client.

Also, the worker should recognize through case work the undeniable intersection of individual and
his or her society and that the situation of the client was a result of vast factors influencing human
behavior be it psychological or interpersonal. Given this, a worker should know that individuals
can be understood and helped to reach social functioning without maltreatment or any form of
victim-blaming tactics. Therefore, the case worker has the obligation or mandate to help an
individual in all the aspects of life to enable the person to function adequately and properly to
fulfill his or her social roles.

To appropriately respond to problems on social functioning, there is a need to have strategies

directed toward the individual if personal inadequacies or sometimes pathologies make it difficult
for the individual to cope with the demands of his situation or environment and the environment.

To sum it up, social case work is not an easy thing to do just because we’re dealing with individuals
because we must also be able to explore their environment and how it will facilitate help the
individuals need. Case work sounds easy to handle but the way I see it, it is through it a social
worker can personally see better change happen. Mastery on case work really is a prerequisite
before we can go on with other methods. In order to do so, it is important for a worker to know
that case work not only requires skill but also love for helping and commitment to the client help
discover his/her potentials and reach social functioning hence proving the case work’s essence in
in-depth helping process.

References:
Mendoza, T. (2008). Social Welfare and Social Work., Quezon City: Central Book Supply, Inc.
Third Edition.
Parmar, A. (2014). Methods of social work and its role in understanding team climate and team
effectiveness for organizational development. Journal of Sociology and Social Work.
Volume 2, No. 1.