This course will build clinical and macro social work students understanding of how social factors like racism, the built environment, and access to care shape the health of populations and produce disparities in health and well-being. We begin by introducing the public health approach and encouraging students to expand their thinking about what contributes to disease or disorder in an individual client (a social work approach), to incorporate an understanding of why certain populations have worse health than others (the public health approach). With that foundation, each week we first build knowledge of the ways that a given element of the social environment (e.g. workplaces, neighborhoods, homophobia and transphobia) impacts population health. We then move from observation to action through discussing the ways that social workers can improve the health of populations they serve through a) intervening directly on that social determinant of health, and b) mitigating the impact of that determinant on the health of clients and communities. Assignments and in-class case studies build students ability to critically analyze the specific elements of their clients and communities social experiences that contribute to patterns of health and well-being.
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