| Summary: | This paper acknowledges that culturally appropriate
social work practice does not take place on a regular and
consistent basis by social workers in the field. An aspect
of social work practice is concerned with helping
individuals, families, groups, and communities in need of
assistance for a variety of reasons. This quantitative
research study investigates culturally appropriate social
work practice in the social work field. Minority persons and
groups are prevalent in Vancouver and the South Fraser
Region. It is important to appreciate and understand their
experiences and respond to their needs through culturally
appropriate social work practice. In this thesis, I present
the different concepts related to culturally appropriate
social work practice, different theoretical viewpoints, and
the results of my quantitative research with social workers
on this subject matter. I examine the research results in
relation to the literature and research. I discuss the
responses from the questionnaires that were distributed to
social workers to explore their knowledge, perceptions, and
experiences of culturally appropriate social work practice.
The research results show that social workers are
challenged when providing services to culturally diverse
clients. Communication barriers such as differences in cultures, language, a lack of education and appreciation of
culture and diversity, cultural insensitivity on the part of
the practitioner, lack of support in the workplace, personal
and institutional biases, and system ineffectiveness prevent
culturally appropriate social work practice from taking
place. The research findings suggest that social workers
from the sample are aware of the concept of "culturally
sensitive social work practice". However, many of them are
not confident in carrying out this type of practice due to
the various reasons mentioned above. The social workers
state that more specialised training on this subject is
needed. I present ideas on how the MCFD can improve
culturally appropriate social work practice in the field.
The findings suggest that the MCFD needs to be more
accountable to culturally diverse clients by providing more
in-depth and appropriate training regarding culturally
appropriate social work practice to its employees, which
includes management, policy developers, and front line
staff. === Arts, Faculty of === Social Work, School of === Graduate
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