“Social Workers Can’t Be Republicans”: Engaging Conservative Students in the Classroom

With Justin E. Lerner, assistant teaching professor, UW School of Social Work

This Advances in Higher Education Research Seminar will explore how to create productive political conversations that encourage true dialogue rather than partisan soundbites.

Over the past 50 years, the United States has experienced the disappearance of a moderate politics replaced by a more divisive political ideology. As the country has become more polarized, universities, schools of social work, and professors have increasingly leaned left. In this era of extreme political polarization, social work educators have a responsibility to create a classroom environment in which conservative students can enhance the diversity of thought in schools of social work so that all students can be more skillful social workers while helping these students understand social work values derived from the National Association of Social Workers’ Code of Ethics.

RSVP: https://forms.gle/Fes2An4Cpyef38uq5