HCAI Grant Helps to Expand School of Social Work
The School of Social Work at CSULB has been awarded a $1.3 million grant by the Department of Health Care Access and Information (HCAI). The grant, entitled Social Work Education Capacity Expansion (SWECE), is aimed at providing resources to expand the social work program at CSULB for Master of Social Work (MSW) students who have an interest in a career in public behavioral health.
“We are grateful to be awarded this grant because the funds will be used to recruit and support public behavioral health internships, needed to expand our program,” said CSULB School of Social Work Director Dr. Nancy Meyer-Adams. This will expand our ability to grow the workforce in this area and across the state.”
According to Dr. Meyer-Adams, there are many high-salaried jobs with comprehensive benefits waiting to be filled in California in public behavioral health settings, such as county departments of mental health, publicly funded community-based organizations and agencies supporting underserved populations, schools, public child welfare and more.
“There are lots of career positions in places of need across the state with many of these in Los Angeles County.”
The difficulty is, the School of Social Work is capable of only admitting approximately 235 new graduate students each fall, from over 1,100 applicants.
“We have a lot of qualified applicants in each admissions cycle, and these positions are in high demand across the state.”
While the MSW program at CSULB is among the largest in the entire CSU, with over 600 students in the program at any given time, internship placements and class space is limited.
“Funds like the HCAI grant that are given to support expanding internship opportunities and support for students and faculty is needed and appreciated.”
In addition, funds from the grant will be used to help provide student stipends, classroom space, and other campus resources that will help to ensure student success.
“Being able to get more people in [to the School of Social Work] and supporting internships will be very helpful to us as a program and for the public behavioral health workforce as a whole.”
