Spring 2026 SOWK 531 Week 07 - Macro Practice in Communities, Understanding Neighborhoods and Communities
Spring 2026 SOWK 531 Week 07 - Macro Practice in Communities, Understanding Neighborhoods and Communities
title: Spring 2026 SOWK 531 Week 07 - Macro Practice in Communities, Understanding Neighborhoods and Communities date: 2026-03-06 13:20:50 location: Heritage University tags:
- Heritage University
- MSW Program
- SOWK 531 presentation_video: > “” description: >
Week seven is synchronous, with class on Saturday (03/07/26). Students will read about understanding neighborhoods and communities in the textbook and reflect on the content in the forums. They will also consider their own community and explore prevention and coalition work. During class we will ground ourselves in the why of community work, explore the functions of community as theory we can apply to community assessment as we as identify other potential theories. We will explore some data sources, and how we can develop power as change agents. There is also an opportunity to engage in some meta discussion regarding the class where we will discuss the community project and student can provide midterm feedback.
The agenda is:
- Why community work
- Functions of a community
- Exploring data sources
- Developing power as a change agent
- Midterm feedback
Learning objectives this week include:
- Identify the professional role of social workers in neighborhoods and communities.
- Utilize theoretical frameworks for understanding communities and neighborhoods.
- Examine and interpret community data from multiple sources to support a community assessment.
- Reflect on the practice of engage in community macro practice work.
- Identify and explore the role of coalitions in community-level prevention and macro practice.
Week Seven Plan
Agenda
- Why community work
- Functions of a community
- Exploring data sources
- Developing power as a change agent
- Midterm feedback
Learning Objectives
- Identify the professional role of social workers in neighborhoods and communities.
- Utilize theoretical frameworks for understanding communities and neighborhoods.
- Examine and interpret community data from multiple sources to support a community assessment.
Community Work: Why Do We Do It and What is Our Role
I want to start our session today, thinking about the why of macro practice in the community.
A lot of the work that I have done regarding community practice is through coalition work, legislative advocacy, and community organizing.
[Whole Group Activity] Peoples Current Experience
- What experience in engaging in community work do any of you have?
- What are some of the macro related tasks and activities you have in your practicum?
[Small Group Activity] Why Do We Engage in Macro Practice
- What are some of the rationales for social workers engaging in macro practice in the community?
- What are some of the skills that we have as a profession for engaging in community work?
[Whole Group Activity] Debrief and Overview
Draw out some examples that groups talk about.
-> Click
We have an ethical obligation (code of ethics) and a practice obligation (makes direct/indirect impact) to engage in community work and social justice activities.
Kirst-Ashman and Hull (2018) describes the following skills generalist social workers have in working in communities:
- Interagency collaboration: Working with committees or task groups across organizations to assess community needs and address shared challenges.
- Identifying service gaps: Recognizing where needed services don’t exist and proposing new programs to fill those gaps.
- Policy advocacy: Pushing for changes in agency or social policies that create barriers or prevent fair treatment of client groups.
- Legislative action: Working through professional associations like NASW to promote laws advancing social, economic, and environmental justice.
- Political engagement: Collaborating with colleagues to support and elect candidates whose values align with the social work profession.
- Opposing harmful organizations: Identifying and taking action against entities that support conditions or laws designed to eliminate people’s rights, including organizing boycotts and leveraging social media.
Functions of Communities and How To Apply Theory
In your community assessment project, you will need to draw on a theory and relate it to your assessment. You can cite your textbook for this or another sources that you have read related to the theory.
I want to share about one potential example, discuss how we can use it in understanding a community, and how to think about applying theory. Warren (1978) as cited in Kirst-Ashman and Hull (2018) describes five functions communities serve:
- Socialization: The transmission of values, culture, beliefs, and norms to community members through both formal mechanisms (laws, rules) and informal ones (social pressure, reactions from others).
- Production, Distribution, and Consumption of Goods and Services: Communities serve as the context in which housing, food, and other essential goods and services are produced, regulated, and consumed by residents.
- Social Control: Communities set limits on behavior by creating and enforcing laws and standards, with social workers often serving as agents of this control function.
- Mutual Support: Community members take care of one another through both informal actions (like giving directions) and formal services (like child protective services or domestic violence shelters).
- Participation: Communities provide residents with opportunities to interact and socialize with one another through recreation, gatherings, or online and virtual platforms.
[Small Group Activity] Discuss in Pairs
- How do you use it as a framework to describe and understand a community? Come up with examples to share.
[Whole Group Activity] Share
Social Workers as Agents of Social Control
The text states:
Social control, which involves setting limits on behavior by creating and enforcing laws via police and other official bodies. In practice, social control is the enforcement of community norms and values… Social workers have been called “agents of social control” because in many positions, the practitioner’s job involves enforcing community standards. (p. 297)
What might you think about this and what kind of challenges does it bring up?
Other Theories: Discussed in Text and Can Connect Assessment
The following are some other theories you might draw on from the textbook.
- Ecological perspective: how people and their environments interact and adapt to each other
- Social systems perspective: viewing the community as interconnected subsystems (the social systems model in Figure 8.2 with government, civic groups, religious organizations, educational institutions, etc.)
- Community resource systems model: (Figure 8.1) person within family, within community, within state
- Social structural perspective: how institutions and structures shape community life
- Human behavior perspective: how individual and group behavior patterns affect communities
- Community change concepts: Competition, centralization, concentration, invasion, gentrification, succession - (LO 8-4, Highlight 8.2)
- Power and stratification: (LO 8-6) e.g. Social stratification, community economic systems, community political systems, and power dynamics (types, sources, and creation of power).
(Kirst-Ashman & Hull, 2018)
Reviewing Data from a Community: Examples of Sources and How to Read
I want you all to spend some time exploring community data and trying to make sense of it.
[Small Group Activity] Exploring community data activity
Working in small groups, explore some of the provided data sources. Be ready to share what you explored and how this data might be useful in community assessment.
Maybe show some examples:
I’d especially encourage some of the local information. I’ve provided links to the Yakima Valley Trends, Healthy Youth Survey, and in the forms and here to the Athena Forum.
Links provided:
General Community Demographics
Health & Wellbeing
- County Health Rankings & Roadmaps
- CDC’s Stats of the States
- Healthy Youth Survey
- Yakima Valley Trends
- The Athena Forum CPWI’s local community coalitions
Social Services / Mutual Support
Education (consider Socialization function)
Economic / Goods & Services
[Whole Group Activity] Share Out
What did you find. What strategies did you take in trying to understand the data you were looking at.
Developing Power in As Change Agent
[Small Group Activity] Reflect on Your Practice with a Partner
Which of these do you do already and which do you need to work on.
- Ensure each of your actions is designed to achieve your purpose.
- Don’t apologize for acting legitimately to achieve your purpose.
- Stay focused on your agenda, and avoid getting sidetracked.
- Avoid arbitrary limits on what actions you will take.
- Remain flexible and unpredictable in your goal-seeking behavior.
- Assess each decision in terms of both short- and long-range consequences.
- Search for areas of agreement with your adversary.
- Allow your opponent some measure of influence in reaching agreements.
- Ensure that each agreed-to action is carried out on both sides.
- Recognize that each behavior is purposeful and designed to achieve some end.
- Seek forgiveness rather than permission when necessary to achieve change.
- Accept responsibility for your own actions; don’t blame others.
(Homan, 2016, pp. 220–221 as cited in Kirst-Ashman & Hull, 2018)
[Whole Group Activity] Debrief
What are ways we can improve doing some of these things?
Assignment 04: Community Assessment Group Project
Meta: Points 100 pts (20% of final grade); Deadline Monday 03/30/26 at 8:00 AM Completion via a forum post on MyHeritage; Locations: MyHeritage Assignment Detail, Assignment Description and Rubric, and W-11 Discussion Forum - Community Assessment Group Project Presentations.
Purpose: This assignment promotes students’ ability to collaborate effectively with peers while demonstrating skills in community assessment and professional presentation. Students will apply theoretical frameworks from Kirst-Ashman and Hull (2018, Chapter 8) to examine a real community, assess its strengths and needs, and consider potential macro-level interventions.
Task: Working in groups, students will select and assess a local community. The group will create a pamphlet summarizing their assessment and deliver a 15 to 20-minute presentation with visual aids. The presentation will be completed virtually, having student post the video and their created pamphlet in the forums. The presentation can be organized including the following information:
- Introduction to the Community: Orient your audience to your community. Provide a clear overview of the community. Factors that may be helpful include location, population characteristics, income level, attractiveness, housing, geography, history, educational opportunities, social/cultural systems in existence, commerce and industry, religion and churches, type of government, political factors, social and health systems, sources of information, and distribution of power, among others.
- Community Assessment: Present your assessment of the community. Describe the steps you took to assess the community. What was the scope of your assessment. Consider connecting it topics such as the five functions of a community or community social stratification discussed in the textbook. Students are encouraged to gather data through multiple methods, which may include reviewing census and demographic data, conducting windshield surveys, interviewing community members or stakeholders, internet searches, and reviewing local media or organizational reports.
- Findings: Summarize the major findings of your assessment, there should be at least three. Identify the community’s key strengths and existing resources alongside its most pressing needs or gaps. Organize your findings clearly — consider using a framework such as strengths, gaps, opportunities, and challenges to present a balanced picture.
- Interventions and Potential Actions: Based on your findings, propose potential macro-level interventions for creating planned change. These might include strategies related to community organization, advocacy, program development, or administrative action. Explain why the proposed interventions are a good fit for the identified needs and how they build on existing community strengths.
- Showcase of Created Pamphlet: Present the pamphlet your group developed as a tangible product of your assessment. It should also be added to the forum post. The pamphlet should distill your key findings and proposed actions into a format that could be shared with community members, stakeholders, or decision-makers.
- References: Slides should designate where you got information from using in-text citations. A reference list should be included to provided the full citations of sources uses during your presentation.
To submit this assignment, one group member will create a post in the Week 11 forum identified for this assignment. The post should include a brief summary of the project, who your group members are, your presentation video, and your pamphlet.
Students may record their presentation in the way that works best for their group. The assignment on MyHeritage is set up as a Learning Tool using Panopto, so students can record directly through Panopto or upload a pre-recorded video (e.g., from Zoom). If using Panopto, you will need to adjust the video’s sharing settings: hover over the video, select the share icon, copy the link, and set “Who can access this video” to public (unlisted). Students may also host their video on another platform (e.g., YouTube or cloud storage) and share the link in the forum instead.
Success: This assignment is graded using the Appendix C Community Assessment Group Project Rubric. A successful project clearly articulates the individualized character of the community, demonstrates a thorough and theoretically grounded assessment, identifies needs supported by evidence, and proposes relevant interventions. The presentation is professionally delivered and the pamphlet is high quality.
Appendix C. Community Assessment Group Project Rubric
The Community Assessment Group Project Rubric is used to evaluate the group presentation and pamphlet students complete in SOWK 531. It evaluates the assignment across six criteria: whether the presentation provides a thorough overview of the selected community, describes the assessment process with connections to theoretical frameworks from the textbook, presents clearly organized findings, identifies actionable macro-level interventions, is professionally delivered, and includes a high-quality pamphlet that could serve as a practical resource for community stakeholders.
| Criterion | Initial | Emerging | Developed | Highly Developed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A thorough community overview that clearly orients the audience to the community. | The presentation offers a limited or unclear description of the community, covering fewer than five aspects or presenting information in a way that does not meaningfully orient the audience. | The presentation describes the community from at least five different aspects. The overview provides a basic sense of the community but leaves significant gaps in the audience’s understanding. | The presentation describes the community from at least eight different aspects. The overview is generally clear and informative but may lack depth or detail in some areas. | The presentation provides a robust overview of the community, describing it from at least ten different aspects (e.g., location, population characteristics, income level, housing, geography, history, educational opportunities, social/cultural systems, commerce and industry, religion, government, political factors, health systems, distribution of power, etc.). The overview provides a well-rounded picture that clearly orients the audience. |
| The assessment process is described and connections are drawn to theory. | The presentation provides a limited or unclear account of the assessment process, with little indication of what the group did to gather information and no connection to theory. | The presentation describes the assessment process but does not connect the work to any theoretical framework from the textbook. | The presentation describes the assessment process and identifies a relevant theoretical framework, but the connection between theory and the assessment is surface-level or lacks detailed explanation. | The presentation clearly articulates the steps and actions taken to understand the community and its needs. Artifacts of the assessment process (such as photos done during windshield survey) are included. The description of the community is connected to at least one theoretical framework drawn from the textbook (e.g., Warren’s five functions of community, social stratification, power dynamics, ecological perspective, etc.), with explanation of how the theory informed the assessment. |
| A set of findings and their analysis is presented. | The presentation identifies one or fewer findings, or findings are presented in a way that is unclear or unsupported. | The presentation identifies two findings. Discussion or analysis of the findings is minimal or one-sided. | The presentation identifies at least three findings, but the discussion does not provide a balanced analysis. | The presentation clearly describes at least three findings about the community (these can be strengths or needs). Each finding includes discussion that provides a balanced picture, considering factors such as strengths, gaps, opportunities, and challenges related to that finding. |
| Potential actionable macro interventions are identified. | One or fewer interventions are identified, or proposed interventions are unclear and disconnected from the assessment. | Two potential interventions are identified. Descriptions may be vague or lack clear connection to the assessment findings. | At least three potential interventions are identified, but descriptions are limited. For example, the audience may understand what is being proposed but not how it connects to findings or how it would be carried out. | At least three potential macro-level interventions are identified. They fit with the identified needs, build on community strengths, and are described in enough detail to understand how they might be accomplished. |
| The presentation is professionally delivered. | The presentation is unclear, highly disorganized, or difficult to follow throughout. | The presentation has noticeable problems with organization, clarity, or delivery that make it difficult to follow at times. | The presentation is organized and clear but lacks smooth flow. Visual aids are present but may not enhance the presentation effectively. | The presentation is professionally delivered, clearly conveys the assessment’s details, and demonstrates strong presentation skills including organization, pacing, and visual aids. |
| A high-quality pamphlet is created. | The pamphlet is not included or is incomplete to the point that it does not function as a meaningful product. | The pamphlet is difficult to follow, unclear in its presentation, or missing key information about the community’s findings and proposed actions. | The pamphlet includes relevant information but has limitations in design, readability, or completeness. It may be difficult to follow in places or lack sufficient detail to stand alone as a useful product. | The pamphlet is well designed and visually appealing, clearly showcases key information about the community (including findings and proposed actions), and could realistically be shared with community members or stakeholders as a useful resource. |
Midterm Evaluations
Please complete this and give me feedback. You can find the SOWK 531 Survey.