THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGANSCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK SW 671 - Social Policy Development and Enactment Winter, 2005 Tuesday, 11-2 Instructor: John Tropman Classroom: TBA Course Description This course will review the overall design or human service systems, how to plan for and design such systems, how to develop the legislative mandates and regulations that operationalize these designs, and how to facilitate their formal enactment. Students will learn both the analytic and interactional skills associated with the development and enactment of policies that give specification to human service systems. Course Content Human service systems include a variety of separate programs, driven by differing policy (legislative and other) mandates. These programs involve extremely complicated implementation procedures and processes. This course will present the beginning level skills associated with the policy design and implementation of complex human service systems. “System design” involves networks of services, agencies, and clients. Therefore, this course will move beyond the individual agency and the single program and in the direction of complex multi-program and multi-service systems. Since one important “stock-in-trade” of policy professionals engaged in most design and enactment tasks is the written policy document, this course will place a heavy emphasis on the skills associated with the preparation of documents, such as memos, briefing papers, policy specification papers, legislative drafts, and program regulations and guidelines. Another important “stock in trade is “the meting” and hence, emphasis will be placed on meting skills as well. Special emphasis will be placed on systems that serve special populations. Course topics may include areas such as the following: • policy concepts and terms; • cycles for developing policies; • diagnosing policy environments (e.g. bureaucratic, fiscal, legislative, community) • advocacy roles (e.g. political, scientific, and ideological); • professional standards and ethics that impact on the selection of advocacy roles; • analyzing complex systems (e.g. issue identification and option generation); • preparing and enhancing utilization of policy documents; • use of quantitative and qualitative data in policy documents; • developing policy(e.g. drafting legislation, writing guidelines and administrative regulations, and developing feedback mechanisms); • selling policy (e.g. “issue selling, lobbying, testifying, and building coalitions of support).SW 671 (Section 001) 2 Winter Semester 2005 Course Objectives Upon completion of this course, students will be able to: 1. Apply beginning level skills in the use of the major analytic tools most commonly used to assess and evaluate complex (policy) systems of human and social services. 2. Apply beginning level skills in the use of interactional tools and techniques for facilitating group process and decision making. 3. Design a procedure for reviewing and assessing a social service (policy) system that encompasses a wide variety of separately mandated programs. 4. Develop and evaluate a reasonable set of options (and policy recommendations) for changing a particular service system. 5. Design and implement (or discuss implementation for ) a preliminary political strategy for facilitating enactment of the preferred option. 6. Organize and prepare different types of policy documents or policy recommendations. 7. Discuss typical ethical concerns related to social policy development and enactment. Relationship of the Course to Four Curricular Themes 1. Behavioral and Social Science Research is a foundational element that suffuses every aspect of the course. All policy analysis and implementation begins with an assessment of “where we are. “ New policy will be addressed will be addressed through review of studies and academic literature on, for example, the changing demographics that affect demand for services, and comparative legal and administrative policies and services and their impacts on families. Finally, program evaluations that can inform child and family welfare policies and service delivery are discussed. 2. Multiculturalism and Diversity will be addressed through, for example, discussion of the client populations served by the service systems discussed in the course; the design of programs so that they will be responsive to the special cultural and ethnic circumstances of their clients; and the special child and family policies related to issues of ethnicity (e.g., the Indian Child Welfare Act, and international and transracial adoption). 3. Social Justice and Social Change will be addressed by considering the differential impact of policies and programs on the poor and minorities. 4. Promotion, Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation will be addressed by examining the continuum of care present in the programs and services provided to children, youth, and families. Thus, neighborhood based or community-based programs will be contrasted with approaches that target families at risk or services recommended for families once they are referred to protective services, services that are court-ordered, or other services that are available only once the state has intervened into the life of families.SW 671 (Section 001) 3 Winter Semester 2005 Relationship of the Course to Social Work Ethics and Values This course covers the complexities of ethical dilemmas as they relate to social policy development and enactment strategies and the ways in which the NASW Code of Ethics may be used to guide and resolve value and ethical issues. In particular, the course will review the ethics and values related to confidentiality, self-determination, respect for cultural and religious differences, and social justice. The course includes consideration of the social worker’s responsibility to promote the general welfare of society (e.g., the prevention and elimination of discrimination, equal access to resources, services, and opportunities, and advocacy for changes in policy) commonly confronted in social policy development and enactment. PODS Suffuse a focus on Privilege, Oppression, Discrimination, and Social Justice throughout the course.SW 671 (Section 001) 4 Winter Semester 2005 DATE # SESSION