Critical Race Theory in The Steve Hicks School of Social Work

Cohort: 2021
Fellow: Sarah Sloan

(Project completed 2023) The challenge this project addresses is to enhance our current curriculum at the Steve Hicks School of Social Work (SHSSW) and provide some of the tools necessary to meet our mandates as a profession. To give some context, the discipline of Social Work is centered in principles from the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) Code of Ethics which includes a strong and clear commitment to working toward social justice and to dismantle systemic barriers that keep all people from liberation and wellness. The school has created a Committee on Diversity and Inclusion, of which I am a part, and named an Associate Dean for Equity and Inclusion, Esther Calzada, Ph.D. In the 2019-2020 academic year the Committee on Diversity and Inclusion (CDI) at SHSSW surveyed the students about the climate of our school. Some of the feedback that we received is that we need to teach other social justice-oriented approaches to make the kind of change Social Workers are tasked to make. The CDI heard the feedback and chose a framework that guides the curriculum toward best practices related to social justice. Itis crucial to our field that we teach interventions that create long-lasting change and work to understand systemic racism. As a faculty and staff we were led to Critical Race Theory as the framework to engage with one another and to include in our Bachelor’s in Social Work (BSW) and Master’s of Science in Social Work (MSSW) curriculum. As you are aware, Critical Race Theory is “a set of ideas that explain what racism is, how it functions in our society, the emotional and psychological experiences of being subjected to racism, and the factors that contribute to the manifestation of racism.” (Valdes et al.2002).The aim of Critical Race theory (CRT) is to “analyze, deconstruct, and transform power by using race as its point of engagement” (Delgado & Stefanic, 2017). This initiative will be related to other social justice work that is already started at SHSSW. In fact, social justice activism has occurred throughout the inception of the school. Individual faculty and groups at the SHSSW, including Dr. Diane McDaniel-Rhodes, Senior PTF, have been working on issues related to social and economic justice, equity, and inclusion, and anti-racist work throughout their tenure. We know that race continues to be a significant factor in understanding inequality in the U.S. Our current understanding and teaching of race and systemic racism at UTSHSSW is not changing outcomes for Black and indigenous people of color (BIPOC)the way we desire. CRT infused in our curriculum would support consciousness about race and would impact how we practice Social Work at all levels of practice. The SHSSW has a need to train all faculty and staff in an understanding of CRT so that they will be engaged with the theory and can use it effectively in teaching. There is also a need to provide a consistent message in our curriculum to students, and all who encounter our school for instruction and training.