Social Work education in India

Studying in one of the foremost and most prestigious (or so it’s called) institutes of Social Work for Rural Development in Maharashtra for the past one year has enabled me to structure my long held thoughts on education better. Education is no more a means to apply knowledge and develop thinking capacities. Today learning has been reduced to being just a medium to ensure one a secure financial future. In the context of my college I can say thus; what is expected of the Agents of Change is very much in contradiction to what these Agents expect of themselves. Concerns of personal future monetary gains are so deep rooted that they far supersede the greater common good for which they claim to have taken up the course.

‘If the ends are satisfied, the ethics surrounding the means are often ignored.’ The following example would help elucidate this statement.

Ex: ‘A good (meaning ‘good placements offering’) college with bad lecturers and poor teaching quality faces no protests from the students. Protest is automatically suppressed in the delight of the expected future good.

I have been witness to innumerable complaints by students most of which emphasize upon the bad food offered, uncomfortable hostels, unfriendly college timings, unnecessary extra classes, etc. None seem to voice opinions regarding the more important points of bad teaching quality and lack of institutional infrastructure to help support our learning. Apart from empty talks amongst a group of friends during lunch or tea, very little initiative is taken in the direction of demanding better quality teachers, most of who happen to be former Social Workers who completed their PhDs from any random university and joined the bandwagon of incompetent university lecturers.

It isn’t difficult to figure out why students remain silent on these issues. Today’s materialistic world has made them so concerned about their future jobs that they fear to protest. The fear rises from the obvious possibility of them being rusticated in the name of ‘misconduct’. Placements have made each one of them so selfish and competitive that there is an utter lack of unity. Fears of gaining a bad impression with the professors surpass all other concerns. Thus, my esteemed Social Work institute continues to churn out students who are taught to suppress dissent in order to gain better grades. With them failing to advocate for their own rights, how is one to expect them to do anything for the people in the future.

In the first few months of our course, we were taught about how we were lucky to have got a chance to study in this college which has given the country some of its best professional social workers. ‘Professional’ of course stood for ‘expert’, ‘trained’ and ‘skilled’; but it was also emphasized (more profoundly, yet indirectly) that it stood for someone who commands a good pay-check in the job market.

“Don’t mistake Social Work with Social Service. We don’t need Gandhis and Mother Teresas. The industry needs professionals not sympathizers”, we were told coldly by our professor.

Social work education seems to stress excessively on the need to be professional as compared to the need to balance it out with being sensitive. The social work sector has been publicized as an ‘industry’ to such an extent that most social work students join with the sole intention of earning a big fat salary in the future. Very few go on to work in the grassroots except when left with no other option.

And when asks one, “What about the primary aim of SW?” prompt comes the answer, “Oh well, we certainly will be working for them. We will be using our professional skills and specialized knowledge (from our air-conditioned cabins in big cities) in order to bring a change in their lives. Of course we will.”

But in a country like ours where poverty seems rampant, how does one view a professional work attitude?

It is good to be professional in one’s work, but being professional in the approach towards one’s work, especially when that happens to be social work is shameful.