Fall 2025 SOWK 486w Class 09 Weekly Email

MyHeritage Syllabus Presentations Emails

Have a wonderful week, remember… no in-person class this week!

Unit Introduction and What You Will Learn

We nine is an asynchronous week, with no in-person class. Last week students read and engaged in class discussion focused on social work assessment. This week we are continuing the same focus. Some forums allow students to respond to questions about the readings, take and reflect on implicit bias, and provide examples of what sources of information we might gather for our assessment based on diverse client needs. I have a lecture video, where we review how we implement social histories and biopyschosocial assessments. The agenda for the lecture video includes:

• Week Nine Content
• Social Histories In the Context of Biopsychosocial Assessment

Learning Objectives for the week include:

• Identify the core components and structure of a biopsychosocial assessment form used
• Explain how to gather and organize information across multiple domains, including psychiatric, medical, social, developmental, and cultural.
• Reflect on the influence of implicit bias in clinical decision-making and utilize the IMPLICIT model to mitigate its impact.
• Determine what sources of information we should be exploring for diverse client populations.

Unit Assignments

Content

• Watch my lecture video

W-09 A-01 Class Engagement and Attendance

With no in-person class this week, we are assessing engagement through the forums and watching the lecture video. The expectation is that each of your replies will be substantive and provide meaningful perspectives, contributing to the forum’s conversation and scholarship. They can be related to the prompts or building on conversations shared by peers. There are three forums for this week, and you are expected to make at least four replies across any of the forums. These forums include the following:

• The Chapter Eight and Nine Content Discussion forum allows students to explore foundational assessment themes like mental status exams, diagnostic labeling, observation, cultural competence, spirituality, and suicide risk across developmental stages.
• Students are encouraged to take an Implicit Association Test and reflect on how unconscious bias may shape assessments in the forum Exploring and Reflection on our Implicit Biasand use the IMPLICIT model to help promote cultural humility in social work practice.
• The Sources of Information Based on Setting or Population forum asks students to apply assessment concepts across diverse scenarios highlighting how setting and population shape the kinds of data social workers collect and prioritize.

I hope that you engage in at least one reply by the middle of the week, but all of your replies must be completed before 8 AM on Monday (10/27/25). You should be reading through all of your peer’s replies.

Unit Resources

All of the presentations for this class can be found at https://presentations.jacobrcampbell.com. This week’s slides are Fall 2025 SOWK 486w Week 09 - Social Histories in the Context of Biopsychosocial Assessment.

The Lecture Videos tab in the MyHeritage course is where you will be able to find class recordings. The video this week is at Fall 2025 SOWK 486w Week 09.

Reference

Hepworth, D. H., Vang, P. D., Blakey, J. M., Schwalbe, C., Evans, C., Rooney, R. H., Rooney, G. D., & Strom, K. (2023). Direct social work practice: Theory and skills (11th ed.). Cengage Learning, Inc.

To-Do List

• Have a great week, no in-person class!
• Watch my lecture video
• Make at least four replies across the three forums