Online Social Work: Practice and Practitioners
July 12 to 21, 2021 (12th edition)
The ISUSW 21 primarily targets M.S.W. students, and Ph.D. students may enroll upon the acceptance by the host university. The ISUSW provides participants from various countries with a unique opportunity to meet and work together during an intensive ten-day course. It has the goal of enhancing international collaboration through providing opportunities for social work scholars and students to analyze and reflect upon the global issues and processes, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, that affect social workers’ everyday practice at the international, national, and local levels.
Currently, COVID-19 has pushed and facilitated many social workers to move their services and practice to virtual platforms. Informed by the values of human development and diversity, the ISUSW 21 program aims to explore a deeper understanding of the online social work approach with a focus on three key areas: (a) the main features, possibilities, and challenges of online social work; (b) social work practitioners’ experiences of conducting intervention online; (c) field-specific issues related to online social work practice. Participants should be able to discover new ideas and practices and critically reflect upon these issues and their relevance for their own professional study and practice.
The organizing University
Shandong University - School of Philosophy and Social Development
Shandong University (SDU) is one of the initiative universities of modern Chinese higher education. Its main body, Shandong Imperial College (Shandong Da Xue Tang), established in 1901, was the second national university in China, only after the Imperial University of Peking. Moreover, it was the first university to be established and run according to a chartered constitution. In recent years, SDU has leaped forward in its development with remarkably enhanced overall strength and competitiveness. Its full-time student population is now up to 60,000, of which 40,789 are full-time undergraduates, 18,816 are postgraduates and 3,791 are international students. 18 disciplines of SDU rank among the top 1% in the ESI Ranking, 5 of which rank top 1‰. SDU comprises 8 campuses in 3 cities (Jinan, Weihai and Qingdao).
The SDU Department of Social Work is among the earliest 28 social work education programs founded before 2000 in Mainland China. Based on a commitment to fundamental social work values and a vision of social justice, we currently offer programs at the undergraduate, master, and doctoral levels and continuous professional education training for those already practicing in the field.