Paying for Social Work Degrees
Help Yourself First
Social workers council and guide all types of individuals and most choose to specialize within the field. Typical industry concentrations include family and relationship counseling, substance abuse counseling and medical social work. Students can certainly stop with a Bachelors degree in Social Work, but most professionals complete at least a Masters in Social Work (MSW). This is the minimum degree for clinical practice.
Federal
Make sure you closely examine all the federal and state grant programs available. These funds are often administered based on financial need.
- The National Institutes of Health sponsors the Research on Social Work Practice and Concepts in Health. There are varying numbers of these grants depending on interest.
- New Jersey's Division of Youth and Family Services is sadly lacking in trained social service personnel so much so that the state utilizes state and federal grants to fund the program. The monetary support makes it possible to pay the tuitions of undergraduate social work students in exchange for a year of work in a DYFS facility.
Colleges and Universities
Colleges and universities with degree programs in social work likely sponsor their own crew of grants and scholarships. Graduate level students will typically find grants designed to fund graduate level and doctoral research:
- Case Western Reserve University provides the Louis Stokes Grant which extends a full tuition for minority students studying at a graduate level and specializing in social work targeted to community development.
- Wayne State University's Scholarship and grant programs are designed for undergraduate, graduate, minorities, women, and the academically talented.
- Wellesley College is one of the top private women's colleges in the country. The college's Margaret Freeman Bowers Fellowship is offered to freshman who will be pursuing either a degree in Social Work, an MBA or Law degree. This is a need-based grant.
Professional Organizations
Professional Social Work associations are instrumental in supporting the profession of Social Work across all aspects of the field. Part of most organizations' missions is to participate in supporting education.
- The National Association of Social Workers is the largest organization serving social workers. Annual grant awards go to social work students who are either conducting research on their dissertations or are implementing community outreach programs in underserved areas.
- The American Cancer Society funds the Masters Training Grant in Clinical Oncology Social Work and the same for Doctoral Training. Social workers who will work with cancer patients must have extremely specialized training in order to be able to emotionally and psychologically guide such a unique group of individuals.
