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I
\

77-25,299
WEINER. Harold Edward. 19*1THE TASKS OF THE SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER AS
PERCEIVED BY SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND TEACHERS
OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED IN MICHIGAN.
Michigan State University, Ph.D., 1977
Education, special

Xerox University M icrofilm s, AonArbor. Michigan48ioe

THE TASKS OF THE SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER AS
PERCEIVED BY SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND
TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
IN MICHIGAN
By
Harold Edward Weiner

A DISSERTATION

Subaitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Department of Elementary and Special Education
1977

ABSTRACT
THE TASKS OF THE SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER AS
PERCEIVED BY SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND
TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
IN MICHIGAN
By
Harold Edward Weiner

This study dealt with the tasks of the school
social worker in Michigan.

School social workers and

teachers of emotionally impaired children were asked to
place themselves in the position of creating the ideal
school social work program by assigning priorities on
a six-point scale to a series of tasks.

At the same

time the respondent was asked to assign a priority to
those sasn tasks in the way he saw them being performed
in his actual setting.

This allowed the researcher to

make some assumptions regarding the discrepancy, if any,
between the actual and ideal functions of the school
social worker in the public schools in Michigan.

It also

permitted him to determine if there were any discrepancies
between the respondents in their perception of the priori­
ties being assigned in the ideal and actual conditions.
A questionnaire was designed to elicit responses
concerning the priorities assigned to eighty-one task

Harold Edward Weiner
descriptors, divided into nine factors, in each of two
conditions (Ideal-Actual).
School social workers returned eighty-nine
questionnaires (a 71.2 percent return) while teachers
of the emotionally impaired returned seventy question­
naires (a 56 percent return).

Multivariate analysis

of variance was used to determine if there were differ­
ences between respondents in their perception of the
importance of nine school social worker activities; if
there were differences between nine Ideal and nine Actual
school social worker activities; and if there were dif­
ferential effects between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired and the Ideal and
the Actual Conditions.

Univariate analysis of variance

was used as a post hoc procedure to determine where the
differences lay.
The statistical tests of the three hypotheses
were significant at the .0001 level.

It was concluded

that school social workers differ from teachers of the
emotionally impaired, that the Ideal Condition differs
from the Actual, and that there is an interaction between
Group and Condition.

Post hoc analyses were carried out

to determine where the significant differences occurred.
There was a statistically significant difference
between school social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired in their perceptions of the priorities

Harold Edward Weiner
assigned to four of the nine factors in the Ideal Condition.
There was also a significant difference between the
respondents in their perceptions of the priorities being
assigned to eight of the nine factors in the Actual Con­
dition.

Leadership and Policy Making was the only factor

that both the teachers and the school social workers saw
as receiving the same importance in the Actual Condition.
All eight of the remaining factors in the Actual Condition
were rated as receiving less importance by teachers.
School social workers perceived those eight factors as
receiving significantly more importance in the Actual
Condition.

A further analysis involved comparisons of

the factor M a n s after these had been transformed into
percentages to make them comparable.
In the Ideal Condition the teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired rated Liaison Between Family and Community
Agencies as receiving the highest priority.

They rated

Casework Services to Parents and Child as next in order
of priority.

School social workers rated Casework Ser­

vices to Parents and Child as the most important function
of the school social worker in the Ideal Condition.

They

rated Interpreting the Child to the Teacher as the next
most important function and Personal Service to the
Teacher as the least important function.
Liaison Between Family and Community Agencies was
rated as receiving the highest priority in the Actual

Harold Bdward Weiner
Condition by teachers of the emotionally impaired.

Per­

sonal Service to the Teacher was seen as receiving the
lowest priority in the Actual Condition by school social
workers, while Leadership and Policy Making was seen as
receiving the lowest priority.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The preparation of a doctoral dissertation is more
than just a one-man venture.

Included in the process are

members of the candidate's family, his colleagues, his com­
mittee, his friends, and even his dog, who at times must
bear the brunt of the despair of the candidate when things
don't go as planned.

Each in their own way has contributed

to the completion of this undertaking.

However, one person

must remain as the single source of the strength that has
sustained me during the dark times.

The memory of my

father, David Weiner, whose teachings, ethical principles,
and understanding helped me to overcome my own failings,
who would have kvelled with great nachas at this accomplish­
ment, must be remembered above all others.
To my mother, whose chicken soup is the greatest,
and to whom the opportunity to say thank you never seems
to be appropriate, I say thank you.
To my wife, Judy, whose encouragement and support
never failed, thank you.
To the members of my committee, Drs. J. Edwin
Keller, Ronald Wolthuis, Eugene Pemell, Sidney Graber,
and Dale Alam, I say thank you.
ii

To those others who helped and encouraged me,
Diane, Will, Swartz, Paul, Betty, Moishe, and Mel,
acknowledgment in this section of the dissertation is
hardly enough.

Thank you.

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter
I.

II.

INTRODUCTION ...............................

1

P r o b l e m ..................................
Pilot Study...............................
Need for the S t u d y ......................
The Present study.........................
Overview of the Study . . . . . . .

3
7
9
11
12

REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE..................
Costin Study ............................
School Social Work 1900-1940 ............
Early Definitions of School Social Work .
The Period
1940-1960....................
The Period.. 1960-1969....................
The Period
1969-1976....................
School Social Work in Michigan . . . .
The Role of the School Social Worker in
M i c h i g a n ...............................
Is There a P r o b l e m ? .....................
What Is the Present Status of Programming
for Emotionally Disturbed Children in
Michigan with Respect to the School
Social W o r k e r .........................

III.

METHODOLOGY INTRODUCTION ..................
General Design of the S t u d y ............
S u b j e c t s ...............................
Selection of the Sample..................
Demographic D a t a .........................
Demographic Data— School SocialWorkers .
Demographic Data— Teachers of the
Emotionally Imp a i r e d ..................
Questionnaire ............................
Hypotheses...............................
Collection of Data . . . . . . . .
Analysis of D a t a .........................
A Percentage Score for Factor Means. *

iv

14
18
25
28
30
32
35
36
40
44

46
48
48
49
50
51
52
63
68
72
72
74
74

Chapter
IV. F I N D I N G S ...................................

V.

77

Post Hoc C o m p a r i s o n s ..................
Rank Order of Factor M e a n s ............

81
101

S U M M A R Y ..................................

105

Limitations of the S t u d y ...............
Discussion...............................
Recommendations .........................

109
112
115

APPENDICES
APPENDIX
A.

COMPLETE LIST OF TASKS USED BY COSTIN IN
ORIGINAL S T U D Y .........................

117

B.

SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER QUESTIONNAIRE

128

C.

TEACHER OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
QUESTIONNAIRE...............

134

TASK DESCRIPTORS CLUSTERED UNDER EACH
F A C T O R ..................................

139

LETTER TO SPECIAL EDUCATION DIRECTORS
INFORMING THEM OF SURVEY AND ENDORSE­
MENT BY STATE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION,
SPECIAL EDUCATION SERVICES ............

145

LETTER TO SPECIAL EDUCATION DIRECTORS
DESCRIBING DISTRIBUTION OF SURVEY
INSTRUMENT...............................

146

DISTRIBUTION OF PERCENTAGES FOR PRIORITIES
ASSIGNED ACCORDING TO GROUP MEMBERSHIP,
CONDITION, AND F A C T O R ..................

147

H.

COVER LETTER TO SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS

161

I.

COVER LETTER TO TEACHERS OF THE EMOTION­
ALLY IMPAIRED............................

162

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................

163

D.
E.

F.

G.

v

. . .

.

LIST OF TABLES
Table
1.

RANK ORDER OF FACTOR M E A N S ...................

23

2.

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO:
(A) NUMBER OF YEARS AS A
SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER; (B) NUMBER OF YEARS
EMPLOYED AS SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER IN PRE­
SENT SCHOOL DISTRICT .....................

53

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO PROFESSIONAL EMPLOYMENT
H I S T O R Y ..................................

54

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO UNDERGRADUATE MAJOR . . . .

55

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO UNIVERSITIES ATTENDED.
. . .

56

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO AREAS OF GRADUATE COURSE WORK .

57

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO FIELD WORK TRAINING SETTINGS

57

3.

4.
5.
6.
7.
8.

9.

10.

11.

.

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO STUDENT/SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER
R A T I O .....................................

58

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO THE NUMBER OF BUXLDINGS
S E R V E D .....................................

59

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
ACCORDING TO AMOUNT OF TIME SPENT WITH
PROGRAMS FOR EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED . . . .

60

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE
FEELINGS REGARDING THE AMOUNT OF TIME SPENT
WITH PROGRAMS FOR THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED .

60

vi

Table
12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.
18.

19.

DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER FOR THE EMOTION­
ALLY IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO YEARS
EXPERIENCE AS A TEACHER FOR THE EMOTION­
ALLY I M P A I R E D ...............................

64

DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER OF THE EMOTION­
ALLY IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO UNDER­
GRADUATE MAJOR...............................

65

DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER FOR EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO THE HIGHEST
LEVEL OF EDUCATION A T T A I N E D ...............

66

DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHERS FOR EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO STUDENT TEACH­
ING OR PRACTICUM SETTING ..................

67

FACTOR MEANS UNDER IDEAL AND ACTUAL CONDITIONS
FOR TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
AND SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS ..................

78

MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE REPEATED
M E A S U R E S ..................................

79

POST HOC UNIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF THE DIFFER­
ENCES BETWEEN SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND
TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED IN
MICHIGAN IN THEIR PERCEPTION OF THE PRI­
ORITIES ASSIGNED TO FACTORS IN THE IDEAL
C O N D I T I O N ..................................

83

POST HOC UNIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF THE DIFFER­
ENCES BETWEEN SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND
TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED IN
MICHIGAN IN THEIR PERCEPTION OF THE PRI­
ORITIES ASSIGNED TO FACTORS IN THE ACTUAL
C O N D I T I O N ..................................

84

20.

RANK ORDER OF FACTOR MEANS IN THE IDEAL
C O N D I T I O N ..................................... 102

21.

RANK ORDER OF FACTOR MEANS IN THE ACTUAL
C O N D I T I O N ..................................... 103

vii

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure
1.

Difference between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to leadership and policy
making in both the Ideal and the Actual con
dition ..................................

2.

Difference between school social worker and
the teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to casework services to
the child and his parents in both the Ideal
and Actual condition ..................

3.

Difference between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to educational counseling
to parents and child in both the Ideal and
Actual condition
.....................

4.

Differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to personal service to the
teacher in both the Ideal and the Actual
condition . ............................

5.

Differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to caseload management in
both the Ideal and the Actual condition .

6.

Differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to interpreting school
social work services in both the Ideal and
Actual conditions ........................
viii

Figure
7.

Differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to liaison between family
and community agencies in both the Ideal and
Actual conditions ............................

96

8.

Differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to interpreting the child
to the teacher in both the Ideal and Actual
c o n d i t i o n s ..................................... 98

9.

Differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan in their perception of the pri­
orities assigned to clinical treatment for
children in both the Ideal and the Actual
c o n d i t i o n s .................................... 100

ix

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

I wish teachers would get over being threatened
by social workers. . . .
I feel that it's important
for social workers and teachers to be able to work
together as a team and their (teachers) being so
threatened constantly interferes with the relation­
ship.
(Professor Shirley Knapman, Michigan State
University School of Social Work, April, 1974)
The major problem is an inherent suspicion and
lack of trust that exists between educators and
social workers.
I really didn't understand what they (social
workers) wanted me to do on behalf of the family
for that kid.
There seems to exist a lack of clear-cut role
parameters: what the social worker is responsible
for and what the teacher is responsible for.
Social workers are always telling teachers what
to do in their classrooms.
(University Advisors of
Emotionally Impaired in Michigan, Meeting at Western
Michigan University, April 26, 1974)
The guidelines under which school social workers
in Michigan presently operate are found in Bulletin #342,
The Michigan School Social Work Service, 1970 revision.
Bulletin #342 (1970) describes the function of the school
social worker as follows:
School social work is provided as a direct and/or
indirect service to all school pupils. By working
with administrators, parents, teachers and other
school staff, pupils, and community agencies, the
school social worker helps to plan, develop and
coordinate programs and activities for the benefit
of all pupils and their families. The school social
worker provides indirect service on behalf of the
1

2
pupil through consultation with school staff,
referrals to agencies, services to parents, and
participation in curriculum planning designed to
alter the pupil's environment. The school social
worker works directly with pupils individually and
in groups to identify, plan and carry through needed
programs for prevention of social and emotional
problems, enrichment of social opportunities, and
restoration of social and educational functioning.
School social work service with a particular pupil
or group of pupils varies in form, length, intensity,
methodology and the persons involved, depending upon
the total situation.
An additional function of the school social
worker is to identify trends in the behavior, con­
cerns, and climate within the school population and
to utilize these trends in consultation and planning
with appropriate school personnel for the benefit of
all pupils. The school social worker must be an
integral part of the school staff and close to the
educational activities of the school in order to
communicate and coordinate his service with other
pupil personnel and educational services within
the school. He supports the development of indi­
vidualized, success oriented curriculum so that edu­
cational experiences meeting each child's develop­
mental needs are provided. He functions as a liaison
between students, staff, other pupil services, and
school administration.
The school social worker is a liaison between the
school and community agencies. He interprets recom­
mendations of clinicians to educators and vice versa
and assists in adapting these recommendations for use
within the educational program. Where appropriate,
he selects and initiates referrals to community
agencies. He works with agencies and school and
community leaders to develop other needed community
services. In order to determine how effectively
school social work programs are meeting pupil's needs,
ongoing evaluation is essential. The school social
work service is one of the pupil personnel services
which a school system may provide. Its emphasis is
on preventive measures and it is designed as one of
the school's services in its mental health program,
(pp. 3-4)
In addition, with the advent in Michigan of Public
Act 198, Mandatory Special Education 1971, and the

3
subsequent Guidelines as promulgated by the State Depart­
ment of Education, the role of the social worker is made
even more specific as it relates to the emotionally
impaired child.
Students who are having academic, social or behavioral
problems with unidentified causes should be referred
to the school social worker for diagnosis. It is the
responsibility of the school social worker to forward
these cases to the Educational Planning and Placement
Committee if the evaluation indicates the student
may be in need of special education services. Besides
providing diagnosis and/or evaluation, school social
workers may provide counseling to the student and
parents; may recommend instructional and behavioral
management techniques; and may help the teacher in
resolving the student's problems.
The school social worker may participate as a member of
the Educational Planning and Placement Committee in order
to assist the committee to "get a complete and accurate
view of the child's functioning level and to write recom­
mendations for the best ways for him to succeed."
Problem
These role descriptions seem to be inclusive and
comprehensive as to the duties and responsibilities of
the school social worker.

The breadth and scope of the

role would seem to meet the needs of teachers, and appears
to satisfy the requirements for good programming for
children.
Recent studies, however, seem to indicate that
this may not be the case.

In the Statewide Survey of

Programs for the Emotionally Disturbed Children in the

4
State of Michigan, December 1971, Donaldson and Schaftenaar
(1971) attempted to ascertain the satisfaction level of
selected teachers regarding certain features of individual
programs.

Their findings indicate that within all areas of

programming for emotionally disturbed children, the satis­
faction level as expressed by the teacher with the category,
Supportive Provisions, which included the school social
worker, ranked sixth out of seven.
Specifically, the teachers stated that in 54.8 per­
cent of the situations where they had consultant service,
these consultants were social workers.

When asked if these

consultant services were adequate, 56.7 percent said no or
were unsure.

Ninety-eight and seven-tenths percent of the

teachers felt that the parents of their students were
in need of therapeutic help.

However, when asked if those

parents were receiving the help they needed, 80.1 percent
of the respondents said, no, or were unsure.

In the

general question regarding the support and assistance
that the teacher needed to meet the emotional and personal
needs of their students, 54 percent of the respondents
replied that these needs were not met.
In another survey of programs for emotionally
impaired children in Michigan, the following results were
obtained:
A.

40% of the respondents indicated that the disci­
pline of school social work was not presently

5

B.
C.
D.

E.

involved in the initial screening and assignment
of all the children presently in the program.
60% of the respondents stated that they did not
receive a written initial report of the social
worker's findings on all of their children.
58.5% of the respondents did not have a personal
initial conference with the school social worker
relative to each child.
36.7% of the respondents did not feel that the
school social worker was sufficiently available
to them for consultation regarding individual
children.
56.5% of the respondents met with the school social
worker two times per month or less, with 46.2%
of the respondents meeting with the school social
worker one time or less per month.
(Coleman &
Mazzei, 1971)
The above studies were conducted during the time

that Public Act 198 was being implemented in Michigan.
Prior to Public Act 198, the school social worker was not
specifically directed to work with emotionally impaired
children.

This in itself may account for some of the con­

fusion regarding the

role

of the school socialworker.

However, it does not

seem

that this is sufficient expla­

nation for the dissatisfaction as expressed by teachers.
Miller (1971), in a study of the role of the
school social worker in public school classrooms for
emotionally disturbed children in Michigan, 1971, may have
alluded to the problem.

Miller dealt with the opinions

of school social workers regarding their having an academic
background in special education.

He found that 56.7 per­

cent felt that an academic background in special education
would be helpful.

However, of that same group

67.5 percent did not

have

surveyed,

even an introductorycourse in

6
the education of the exceptional child.

He concluded that

while the trend in school social work was toward the worker
having an academic background in special education, only
a small percentage of the practicing school social workers
had any background in special education.
On April 26, 1974, at a meeting of the University
Advisors for Emotionally Impaired in Michigan representing
all the teacher training institutions that prepare
teachers in the area of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan, the author asked the following question:

How

do you as professionals view the school social worker?
The responses were recorded in the author's absence.
There was a general consensus of opinion that there were
serious problems in the relationships between school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired.
These concerns centered around the following issues:

a

mutual suspicion and lack of trust between the professions;
a lack of understanding on the part of both professions as
to what the other wanted them to do; a lack of clear-cut
role parameters; a poorly defined classification of the
responsibilities of each profession; and a feeling on the
part of teachers that school social workers felt superior
to teachers.
These issues, coupled with the results of earlier
studies, added impetus to the author's interest in

7
exploring -the relationship between teachers of the
emotionally impaired, and school social workers.
Pilot Study
A pilot study was developed to ascertain the feel­
ings of selected school social workers and teachers of the
emotionally impaired in the city of Lansing, Michigan.
Six teachers and six school social workers were interviewed
and their responses were recorded.
asked the following question:

Each individual was

As it relates to the nature

of your job, what is your feeling about either school
social workers or teachers of the emotionally impaired?
A cursory analysis of the responses of these pro­
fessionals indicated that there are different perceptions
of the roles of the opposite professional.

Social workers

indicated that they were the major source of therapy to
the child.

The school social worker tended to view the

teacher as a person who is responsible for the trans­
ference of cognitive knowledge and the maintainance of
order and discipline within the framework of the classroom.
They saw the teacher as not having the skills or ability
to work with the complexities of the child's psychological
makeup.

They felt uncomfortable with the idea that a

teacher might be working with parents, or with agencies
that had some involvement in the overall treatment of the
child.

They expressed little interest in the academic

8
climate of the classroom, and at times explained that
their role did not necessitate an understanding of aca­
demics.

When asked by teachers to do academic tutoring,

the school social worker usually turned the teacher down.
The school social workers generally viewed themselves as
having the responsibility for the mental health of the
children in the classroom and viewed the teacher as an
ancillary service to the school social worker and the
child.
The teacher, on the other hand, tended to view
the school social worker as a person who is responsible
for elements in the environment of the child which
directly relate to his functioning in the classroom.
These included work with parents, siblings, and agencies
outside the school.

Teachers felt uncomfortable with

the idea that a school social worker saw only one child
at a time, and expressed an interest in knowing what had
occurred during the appointment with the child.

When

asked if there was any feedback regarding that appointment,
the teacher's usual response was, no.

The teachers gen­

erally felt that they were the major source of therapeutic
change in the behavior of the child.

The perception of

the role of the school social worker from the perspective
of the teacher was that of an ancillary agent whose primary
function was to work with the parents of the child, and
to extend and promote the programs of the classroom.

9
Need for the Study
The preceding discussion points out the apparent
need for a clarification of the role of the school social
worker as it relates to programs for emotionally impaired
children.

It indicates that in spite of the clearly

stated role description as pointed out in Bulletin #342
(1970), and as redefined and made more specific in the
Guidelines for Special Education Programs and Services in
Michigan (1974) there appears to exist a discrepancy
between the role description and the subsequent delivery
of the service to the consumer, namely, the teacher of the
emotionally impaired.
This study is an attempt to ascertain whether or
not discrepancies of the nature previously described exist
on a statewide basis, and what, if any, those discrepancies
might be.

It has important implications as follows:

1.

For the State Department of Education.

should provide relevant information to the State Department
of Education regarding the perceptions of the tasks of the
school social worker from the perspective of both school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired.
It should afford the State Department with directions in
planning for inservice meetings to be held for both school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired,
to mutually plan and revise areas in which there may be
discrepancies.

It

10
2.

For University Training Programs.

It should

provide to both schools of education and schools of
social work, relevant Information regarding the need for
possible reevaluation In Individual training programs as
they relate to the needs of the opposite profession.

In

addition, it should provide information which would be
helpful in determining if there is the necessity for
closer communication and interaction between the two
schools.
3.

For School Social Workers.

It should provide

information to school social workers about the perceptions
of their colleagues, and the primary consumers of their
services, teachers of the emotionally impaired.

It

should allow them the opportunity to assess their own
functioning in comparison with other social workers in
the state.
4.

For Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired.

It should provide information about the tasks of the
school social worker from the school social worker's
perspective.

It should also provide information about

the functioning of the school social worker on a statewide
basis, and could be utilized as a basis for the recommen­
dation for change.
An improved understanding of the tasks of the
school social worker should lead to an awareness of the

11
need for better conditions for interaction, and conse­
quently to the improvement of the services to emotionally
impaired children in Michigan.
The Present Study
This study deals with the tasks of the school
social worker in Michigan.

It asks school social workers

and teachers of emotionally impaired children to place
themselves in the position of creating the Ideal school
social work program by rating the tasks involved on a
priority basis.

This gives the respondent the opportunity

to describe the way he feels things ought to be.

At the

same time he is asked to assign a priority to these same
tasks in the way he sees them being performed in his
Actual setting.

This allows the researcher to make some

assumptions regarding the discrepancy, if any, between
the Actual and the Ideal functions of the school social
worker in the realm of the public school in Michigan.
Many studies have been done which describe the
role of the school social worker (Costin, 1963; Wadsworth,
1970; Pearman, 1955; Miller, 1971)•

However, each of

these was done only from the perspective of the school
social worker.

While each of these studies was complete,

no assessment was attempted to ascertain the needs of the
consumer group.

No teachers, parents, children, or

12
administrators were included in the attempts to describe
the role of the school social worker.
The purpose of this study is to investigate the
tasks of the school social worker from both the perspective
of the school social worker and the teacher of the emotion­
ally impaired, and to ascertain if there are differences
in the way these tasks are viewed in both the Ideal and
the Actual situation within which the respondents are
working.
Overview of the Study
The remainder of this study is organized in the
following way:
In Chapter II, literature relevant to the present
study is reviewed.

Included in this review is a brief

historical overview of the field of school social work.
In Chapter III, the methodology used in the present
study will be discussed.

The questionnaire, "Tasks of the

School Social Worker," will be explained.

The results

of the demographic data obtained from the respondents will
also be included in this chapter.
Chapter IV contains the results of the statistical
analysis of the obtained data.
Chapter V presents a summary of the data, con­
clusions, and recommendations which may be useful to the

13
school social work program and to the special education
program for emotionally impaired children in Michigan.

CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

School social workers are increasingly being used
as one member of the noninstructional staff who deals
with pupils or groups of pupils to help them overcome
obstacles that interfere with learning.

According to

Costin (1968), the school social worker's function in
the school is generally described as adding,
. . . his professional competence to that of
teachers, administrators, and other specialists in
helping children and youth with various problems
which keep them from achieving appropriate edu­
cational goals. The aim is to enable these children
to make maximum use of their opportunities to learn
and to become contributing members of society.
(p. 1)
However, a pressing problem which is evident in
both education and social welfare is the shortage of man­
power needed to perform the tasks required by the employ­
ing institution.

It has been estimated that during the

decade of the seventies, approximately 21,000 school
social workers will be needed to meet the growing needs
of the schools (United States Department of Health, Edu­
cation, and Welfare, 1965).

This does not even take into

consideration the advent of new programs and services in

14

15
the schools, particularly the mandatory special education
programs which require additional social work services.
With this critical shortage of professional social
workers and the pressing economic and social problems that
the schools are facing, it becomes apparent that the tasks
of the school social worker need to be clear and specific
enough that other professionals are fully aware of them,
yet broad enough not to be confined to those problems that
are the most easily remedied.
Another important consideration relating to the
shortage of social workers is the reallocation of staff.
Barker and Briggs (1966) suggested that the utilisation
of both differentiated staffing and the use of the worker
at the baccalaureate level may be a step toward solving
the problem.

However, there has been little research

evidence to support this as a viable approach.
In addition to the shortage of school social
workers, other disturbing conditions exist in the schools
which have a bearing on the effectiveness of the social
worker.

These problem areas are reflected in the large

numbers of children who drop out, who do not learn, and
who graduate without being prepared for higher education
or the transition to employment.

Costin (1968) describes

these social ills as:
a.
b.

lack of jobs for certain groups of youth and
heads of families
deplorable housing for large numbers of the popu­
lation

16
c.
d.

high rates of delinquency
a pervading sense among many Individuals that
they lack the power of self direction and are
subject to the restrictive rules of bureaucracies
which limit their dally experience and those of
their children, (p. 6)
Not only Is It the society and the family which

are contributing to the problems, but In many cases It Is
the school Itself which has a hand In creating and per­
petuating the problem.

Various authors have described the

problems as follows:
(1) racial and economic segregation;
(2) belief in the limited potential of disadvantaged
pupils;
(3) the use of ability and achievement tests without
regard to the extent that they measure past learn­
ing opportunities and experiences and the
familiarity with the kind of task and situation;
(4) school practices in relation to control of
students* behavior
(a) labeling of students
(b) exclusion;
(5) the task of coordination, the point of view and
the actions of various professionals within
and outside the school;
(6) community-school distance.

17
In a biting attack of the public schools, Schafer
and Polk (1967) describe the role that the school plays in
causing more problems for children.
The psychologist, the speech therapist, the social
worker, the attendance officer, the counselor, the
principal and the classroom teacher all tend to view
the problems of student's education and misbehavior
from different perspectives. Hence they seek out
different types of information and follow varying
courses of action. The result is the frequent "atom­
isation" of the school's response to students in
trouble, (pp. 256-257)
Costin (1968) also expressed concern with the role
that the school played in perpetuating problems for chil­
dren.
The responsibility for students in trouble may be
pushed off from the school to community youth-serving
agencies, with insufficient communication between
school and community agency and lack of attention
to the adaptations which must be made within the
school system itself— adaptations which could help
the pupil, and others like him, to perform more
successfully, (p. 13)
Costin (1968), concerned with attempting to define
the role of the school social worker in a fashion which
provided the most service without jeopardizing the indi­
vidualized attention required to make that service the
most effective, assumed that,
. . . a definition of school social work which has
viability in today's world cannot reflect a residual
view of social welfare, one which uses up its
available professional manpower without sufficient
attention to the most pressing problems of the
school population and the underlying causes and
conditions (both within and without the school sys­
tem) which impinge upon large numbers of unsuccessful
school children, (p. 15)

18
It was based on the above considerations that
Lela B. Costin, Professor, Jane Addams Graduate School
of Social Work, University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois,
designed a study which attempted to answer the following
questions:
1.

What is the content of the function of school
social work and the relative importance of its
parts as defined by professional social workers
closely related to this field of practice?

2.

Does such a definition of function provide a
promising basis for experimentation in assigning
responsibilities to social work staff with dif­
ferent levels of education or training?
Costin Study

Method
Costin (1968) assembled a comprehensive list of
tasks known to be included in the activities of school
social workers.

She culled these descriptors from con­

sultation with professionals and from the literature of
the field.

Each task was written in behavioral terms

and designed to describe a particular function of the
school social worker in relation to the community,
parents, teachers, administrators, and other school
personnel.
Appendix A.)

(For a complete list of these tasks, see
After a preliminary investigation, 107

19
items emerged which were used as the basis for the
questionnaire which was administered to a sample N ■ 354
of school social workers in the United States.

Two

hundred and thirty-eight questionnaires (67.2 percent)
were used in the analysis.
Each respondent was asked to answer the following
questions for each task:
1.

How important do you consider the task for the
attainment of school social work goals within a
school system?
Respondents were asked to rate the importance of
the task on a four-point scale from 0 (not impor­
tant) to 3 (very important).

2.

Can the task appropriately be assigned to a person
with less than your level of education and pro­
fessional preparation?
Respondents indicated their opinion on a fourpoint scale indicating whether a task could
never, occasionally, frequently, or always be
assigned to a person with less education and pro­
fessional preparation than their own.

Analysis of Data
The first data analyzed were answers to the
question, "How important do you consider the task for
the attainment of school social work goals within a

20
school system?"

A factor analysis was carried out.

The

method of principal axes analysis was used, the factors
and loadings being produced by rotation, using the varimax
technique.

(For a complete and technical description of

this technique, see Rummell [1970].)
The second set of data was analyzed using a com­
parison of means of individual tasks.

Also compared were

the means of the groups of items which were assembled under
the derived factors.

This method determined relative

assignability of each of the factors.
Results
Description of Factors.

Factor analysis revealed

a meaningful structure among the tasks.
emerged.

Nine factors

Costin (1969) describes each of the factors as

follows:
Casework service to the child and his parents. This
factor defined a way of offering help lo theindi­
vidual child and his parents in relation to the
child's personal problems. The approach is a gen­
erally supportive one, and the emphasis is upon
diagnosis, clarification of the problems with other
school personnel and with parents, and work with the
child concerning his feelings, attitudes, and
relationships to adults and other significant
persons in his life.
Caseload management. Tasks included in this factor
typify fairly routine tasks necessary to an effective
and well-organized day-by-day management of a work
load.
Interpreting school social work service. The principal
aim of tasks which make up this factor is to interpret,
clarify, and coordinate school social work services
with other special services within a school system.

21
Clinical treatment of children with emotional
problems^ This factor contains tasks which represent
a treatment relationship to the child. Through use
of a casework relationship or the group process, the
worker helps the child to gain insight into his
emotional problems, to develop his personal goals
and values, and to change his behavior in life situ­
ations. Work with the child's parents is not repre­
sented in this factor.
Liaison between the family and community agencies.
Tasks contained in this factor appear to measurethe
role of the school social worker acting as a liaison
between a child and his parents and the existing com­
munity agencies. Emphasis is upon obtaining infor­
mation about an individual family's functioning or
experiences of community agencies in relation to that
family, with active support offered to the child and
his family in the use of community agencies. The
focus is upon the individual child and family and
their use of existing community resources. This
differs from the "community service" items in the
factor called "Leadership and policy-making," which
reflect responsibility for community planning and
social change.
Interpreting the child to the teacher. The school
social work tasks which compose this factor are ones
that find the social worker acting mai&ly to help the
teacher understand a specific child in relation to
the use of school social work service. This factor
has not been called "consultation with the teacher,"
since the tasks seem designed to facilitate use of
school social work service in relation to a par­
ticular child, rather them consultation for a
broader school purpose.
Educational counseling with the child and his parent.
School social work tasks included in this factor
describe a kind of work with the individual child
and his parents which is oriented toward the school's
educational function. This factor includes expla­
nation and clarification of the school's social and
academic expectations and of its authority, help to
parents for improving their relationship to the
school, and help to the child in the area of his
educational goals, values, abilities, and interests.
Leadership and policy-making. This factor appeared
to measure school social work responsibility for
professional leadership in relation to the school
and community, and service to the school adminis­
tration in the area of pupil-welfare policy. High
loadings were found on those tasks having to do with

22
-the status of the social work and education pro­
fessions, consultation with school administrators,
community services in relation to social planning
and social action, and work with groups of parents
about their school concerns.
Personal service to the teacher. Tasks included in
this factor seem related to those described for the
factor, "Interpreting the child to the teacher."
These appear to measure activity of the school social
worker in relation to a teacher's personal problems
as they affect her interactions with a child in
her classroom, or as they interfere in other ways
with her work. This factor is omitted from further
discussion of findings because it appears to repre­
sent a "rejected" set of tasks, that is, tasks which
were rated very low in importance, with frequent
marginal comments by respondents suggesting that
these tasks were inappropriate for a school social
worker's activity, (pp. 275-76)
Importance of School Social Work Tasks.

In

response to the question, "How important do you consider
the task for attainment of social work goals within a
school system?" means were computed for each of the
107 items on the questionnaire.

In addition, means were

computed for each group of tasks within a factor.

Table 1

shows the factor means, ranked from high to low.
In analyzing the items contained in the six
highest rated factors, it was found that school social
workers seemed to define their role in a way which focused
on an individual child in relation to his emotional
problems and his personal adjustment.

In contrast with

the higher rated factors, those tasks that social workers
rated of lower importance were generally concerned with
the child's educational goals, values, abilities, and
interests.

23

TABLE 1
RANK ORDER OF FACTOR MEANS
# of
Tasks

Factor
Mean

Standard
Deviation

13

2.90

.356

Caseload management

7

2.73

.549

Interpreting school social
work service

8

2.72

.549

Clinical treatment of children
with emotional problems

7

2.68

.541

Liaison between the family and
community

6

2.71

.537

Interpreting the child to the
teacher

5

2.63

.591

Educational counseling with
the child and his parents

12

2.31

.834

Leadership and policy making

18

2.20

.846

Personal service to the teacher

6

1.80

.981

Factor
Casework service to the child
and his parents

24
Assignability of School Social Worker Tasks.

In

response to the question, "Can the task appropriately be
assigned to a person with less than your level of edu­
cation and professional preparation?", mean ratings were
computed for each task and for groups of tasks under the
factors.

It was found that there was a prevalence of low

ratings, concluding that in general, social workers were
reluctant to assign their tasks to persons with lesser
education and professional preparation.
Conclusions
Costin (1969) concludes:
1.

2.

3.

The definition of school social work revealed by
this study reflects the school social work liter­
ature of the 1940's and 1950's and shows little
or no general response to the concerns expressed
in both education and social work literature of
the 1960's in relation to the learning problems
of many unsuccessful school children and youth;
the underlying conditions in the school, neigh­
borhood, and community which contribute to their
difficulties; and new approaches to use in
delivery of services to them.
The definition is a static one, which reflects a
residual conception of social welfare. It
largely ignores the most pressing problems of
the school population, the underlying conditions
which produce these problems, and the relationship
of the school and its operations to those of
other social institutions in the community.
The definition does not provide a promising basis
for experimentation in assigning responsibility
to social work staff with different levels of
education. The definition commits its profes­
sional personnel to use up its resources in
providing a limited range of social work services,
without sufficient attention to the most pressing
problems of school children and youth, problems
which would lend themselves to experimentation

25
in design of services and staffing patterns.
School social workers seem unready to delegate
many of the tasks that they regard as important,
a finding that grows logically from the defi­
nition of social work which they evolved, (p. 280)
Given the above conclusions from Costin1s compre­
hensive study, it is important to the understanding of
the present study that we look at the possible reasons why
school social workers arrived at the point of being un­
responsive to the needs of the schools, unwilling to desig­
nate tasks to others, and unaware or unconcerned with the
needs (academic and social) of a large number of their
clients.

In order to begin to understand how school social

work arrived at a point in its history in which this un­
responsiveness seems to be the rule, a brief history of
the profession seems to be in order.
School Social Work 1900-1940
School social work programs begem inauspiciously
in New York through the attempts of social workers, who
contacted teachers in an effort to gain a better under­
standing of the children who were coming to the settlement
houses.

This was to provide the worker with some

acquaintance with the educational problems of the
children (Pearman, 1955; Johnson, 1962).
Following these efforts, New York, Boston, and
Hartford, all working independently with community
financing, became the first cities in the United States

26
to have school social work programs.

Initially there was

some hostility from teachers, but the advances being made
in the areas of psychology and sociology, coupled with
the realization that the school must assume some of the
responsibilities of the church and the home, helped to
allay some of the suspicions (Pearman, 1955).
Modified forms of these earlier programs were
instituted in Philadelphia; Worster, Massachusetts;
Rochester, New York; Kansas City; Minneapolis, and
Chicago between 1909 and 1919.

It was evident that the

growth of the larger cities with their diverse populations,
industrialized and urban nature would lead to a need for
more social work services.

Each new program was designed

to meet conditions that were constantly changing.
The Commonwealth Fund aided the growth of school
social work programs by sponsoring demonstration projects
on a nationwide basis from 1921 until 1930.

Funds were

provided contingent upon the local community's willingness
to continue support of the program.

Twenty-one of the

original thirty school systems continued the social work
programs, including Kalamazoo and Detroit, Michigan.
From 1917 until 1942, the White Williams Foundation
contributed to the growth of social work programs by
providing funds for the training of school social workers
(Pearman, 1955).

27
In 1919, the National Association of Visiting
Teachers and Home and School Visitors was established.
This organization's goals were to:

M . . . develop

standards of work among its professional members, and,
through personal efforts and the publication of reports,
it endeavors to promote the development and extension of
the work and to assist those who may establish it in new
communities" (Nudd, 1930, p. 5).
Nudd (1930) reported that there were 258 visiting
teachers in ninety-five cities and eight counties in
thirty-eight states.

Pearman (1955) reports that by 1944

school social work programs had expanded to include 266
cities in the United States.
In the decade of the thirties there was a retard­
ation in the growth of the movement of school social work.
Schools either cut back or eliminated the service alto­
gether.

According to Costin (1969), the social needs of

the students in school, clothing, hot lunches, and just
the basic necessities of daily living, eliminated the
social workers from engaging in casework delivery.
Costin (1969) continues.
In the selection of cases for service, priority
shifted from the dependent and delinquent child;
concern was expressed that programs labeled for the
prevention of delinquency like those sponsored by
the Commonwealth Fund in the twenties, stigmatized
and therefore negated many possibilities for con­
structive service. School social workers began to
avoid an image of authority or involvement with

28
law enforcement duties, such as attendance, and
emphasis was given to the goal of happy, wholesome
childhood for all children.
(p. 445)
This change in emphasis was criticized by some
of the writers of the day.

They concurred that the

emphasis should be placed back on the casework approach.
By forgetting the problem children, they were in the long
run creating more problems for the future.
What kinds of factors were present in the society
which contributed to the felt need for school social work,
and what contributed to the steady rise in the numbers of
school social workers?

Costin (1969) attributed this need

to the nationwide passage of compulsory school attendance
laws and the concommitant populating of the schools with
children who were illiterate and illequipped socially to
handle the day-to-day trials of school attendance; increased
knowledge and awareness of the concept of individual dif­
ferences among children and their ability to respond to
improved conditions; and an increased awareness of the
place that school and education played in the lives of
children.
Early Definitions of School
Soc ial Work
According to Costin (1969), the earliest defi­
nitions of school social work consisted of two parts:
interpreting to the school the child's out-of-school life;

29
and interpreting to the parents the demands of the
school and explaining the peculiar difficulties and
needs of the child.
Nudd (1930), in an early publication. The Purpose
and Scope of Visiting Teacher Work, discusses the role of
the school social worker in terms of the personality and
training of the individual.

He emphasizes that the train­

ing that she received as a teacher places her in a position
to understand the workings of the school.

In addition,

her educational experiences with psychology and psychiatry
allow her to detect symptoms of serious disturbance, and
to communicate effectively with specialists.

Nudd (1930)

concludes that the school social worker, " . . .

does many

things directly to remedy a given situation, but her aim
is primarily not to duplicate what can best be done by
others, but rather to bring into effective cooperation,
for the welfare of the particular child, those agencies
or measures which her knowledge of the situation indicates
as essential" (p. 5).
It is important to note that in analyzing Nudd's
definition, the aims and goals of the early social workers
were as follows:

liaison with teachers and administrators

in the schools; liaison with parents; liaison with social
agencies; working with parents; working with community;
and a basic casework knowledge to work with the child.

30
These basic principles seem to correlate with what
Costin found in her study.
The Period 1940-1960
During the decade of the forties, state departments
of education showed a growing interest in the field of
social welfare.

Legislatures were encouraged to support

or implement school services to include the social worker
as a member of the staff.

By 1951, Louisiana, Georgia,

Virginia, Maryland, Michigan, Illinois, and Texas had
developed some type of programming financed through the
cooperation of both state and local communities (Pearman,
1955).

It was also during this time that the transition

from the earlier focus on school and neighborhood con­
ditions changed to a clinical orientation, with the primary
method of treatment being individual casework directed
toward the emotionally maladjusted child (Costin, 1969).
At a national conference of the National Associ­
ation of Social Workers held at Lake Forest, Illinois
(1958), it was the overall recommendation that the use
of the casework be utilized as the prime therapy.

How­

ever, it was recognized that referral of children was
also a requisite to good work and good working relation­
ships.

An underlying concept of the conference was that

the school social worker should always consider the
quality of her service, and this concept implied that

31
the casework approach with Its intensity was preferred
to a more limited approach with its short-term effects.
The period of the forties and fifties was a time
of great concentration on the individual child utilizing
the casework approach.

This concentration had the ten­

dency to remove the school social worker from involvement
with the ongoing nature of the school.

it prevented the

school social worker from gaining an understanding of the
problems within the school which may have contributed to
the problems of the child.
In a study of school social workers in twelve com­
munities, Mildred Sikkema (1953) found many of the afore­
mentioned problems.

She suggested that the following

areas of concern were of particular importance to the
school social worker of the future.

The school social

worker must achieve proper clearance between himself and
the principal.

He must be attuned to attitudes which

cause him to regard himself as an invading specialist
rather than part of the school staff.

He must be aware of

attempts to overload him with so many tasks that he is
unable to make use of his own competence.

Some teachers

and principals refer few cases because they feel that
the cases are handled too slowly.

School social work

must be extended in the high schools, with less concen­
tration on attendance problems.

School social workers

32
and teachers must have time for regular contacts regardIng pupils with problems.

School social workers need

to be more adequately trained.
The Period 1960-1969
The rapid expansion of the population of schoolaged children during this time necessitated changes in
the approach to school social services.

Lundberg (1964)

indicated evidence of transition as follows:
1.

2.
3.
4.
5.

An attempt by school social workers to evaluate
the appropriate balance between professional
time devoted to direct services and consultative
services to other school staff members;
Increasing attention to group work as a school
social work method;
Concern about establishing an effective organi­
zational relationship with other pupil personnel
services;
The effect on school social work programs of
educations involvement in seeking solutions to
the problem of nonattendance; and
A growing awareness of the need for all youth to
develop social and economic competence.
There was an increased emphasis on the school as

a social institution.

Johnson (1962) suggested that the

social worker understand the school as a particular type
of social organization in order to make his services
effectively a part of it.

Beck (1965), in an attempt to

discuss the challenges of the sixties to social workers,
suggests that efforts be made to bring about more effective
professional relationships between the professions of
education and social work at all levels of practice.

33
and -that the best place to start this collaboration is
in the professional educational ranks, namely the pro­
fessional schools.
The concentration on casework approaches that
existed during the previous decades began to give way to
new methods.

The early emphasis on individual casework

gave way to experimentation in group work.

Authors

urged more involvement of school social workers in the
ongoing function of the school as a system.

In a sig­

nificant study, Vinter and Sarri (1965) described an
effective group approach to dealing with children.

They

found that the school social worker undertook certain
activities including direct work with pupils, mediation
with teachers and other school personnel focused on spe­
cific pupils in difficulty; consultation to teachers
directed toward improvement of classroom patterns, modifi­
cation of teacher perception, or change in school policy
and procedures; and negotiation with families and agencies
to resolve a particular problem situation.

Vinter and

Sarri (1965) pointed out that.
If the social worker concentrated his energies mainly
on helping some pupils accommodate to the school,
he can do little to ameliorate the patterns that will
continue to generate difficulties for many other
students. If he addresses himself primarily to
attributes of the pupil (or his family situation)
which seem to be contributing to malperformance, the
effectiveness of his helping efforts will be greatly
reduced. It seems important therefore that the
social worker retain dual perspectives, and attempt

34
to resolve problem situations or processes; both
pupils and school conditions should be targets of
his interventive activity. He must find ways of
serving specific individuals while simultaneously
dealing with the source of pupil difficulties within
the school.
(p. 13)
The decade of the sixties was a time of confusion
about the role of the school social worker.

Traditional

approaches originally emphasized the community school
liaison.

During the forties and the fifties, the emphasis

shifted from the community to the individual child through
the use of casework.

Then during the sixties, the shift

went back to a renewed emphasis on the community.

New

approaches were being advocated and experimentation was
popular.

However, as Costin (1969) pointed out, even with

the new evidence pointing toward a new involvement with the
community, and concern with the school as an institution,
the social worker on the front lines was following prin­
ciples that were prevalent in the forties and the fifties.
Costin (1969) sums up the period of the sixties
thusly:
Because professional social workers in schools
apparently have not responded sufficiently to the
most pressing problems of communities and to the
experimentation and demonstrations of new kinds of
service that have gone on in some schools in recent
years, they still generally follow a traditional
model of school social work service that has not
compelled them to reexamine critically their goals
and their staffing patterns.
(p. 453)

35
The Period 1969-1976
It seems that the period of the seventies has not
fully resolved the confusion among social workers as to
the specifics of their role.

While they are trying to

meet the challenge of the tiroes, they are keenly concerned
with the definition of their role, and aware of the problems
associated with attempts to define a role as complex as
that of social welfare in the schools.

Costin (1972),

describing the major responsibilities of the social worker
in relation to the situation in the schools today, suggests
that the social worker:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

Should facilitate the provision of direct edu­
cational and social work services to some
selected pupils;
Should act as a pupil advocate;
Should consult with school administrators in
order jointly to identify a problem situation
or problem complex;
Should consult with teachers about techniques
for creating a climate in which children are
motivated to learn;
Should organize parent and community groups;
Should develop and maintain a productive liaison
between the school and critical fields of social
work and legal practice; and
Should provide leadership in the coordination of
interdisciplinary skills among pupil services
personnel.
(p. 351)
She suggests approaching school social work from

the same perspective as was discovered in her original
research.

However, she seems to be placing emphasis on

the social workers taking more of a leadership role in
the schools and recognizing the role that the school plays
in contributing to the problems of the child.

36
Wadsworth (1970) describes the main goal In
school social work as the ability to bring about
behavioral changes in problem children.

He suggests

that:
Laying blame does not do this and elaborate testing,
diagnostic workups, and case records have little
value in changing behavior. Teachers are becoming
tired of the social work jargon and studies that
either confuse them or tell them what they already
know.
(p. 60)
In order to resolve these problems he suggests
the following guidelines for social workers in order to
help them in their relationship to teachers (Wadsworth,
1970):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Extensive and regular classroom visiting should
be used.
Informal contacts with teachers during lunch and
at coffee breaks are recommended.
Discussion with those outside the profession
should be completely nontechnical and avoid jargon.
Staff conferences should be conducted so that the
teacher feels more like a consultee than a client.
Consultation with classroom teachers should focus
on the teacher's world and not on the specialist's
diagnostic analysis.
Behavior modification techniques may be used.
(p. 60)
School Social Work in Michigan
It is interesting to note that the state of Michigan

paralleled the rest of the nation in the general growth
of school social work.

As was pointed out earlier, two

of the original programs sponsored by the Commonwealth
Fund were in Detroit and Kalamazoo, Michigan.

These

programs with their emphasis on prevention of delinquency

37
were the forerunners of the program in Michigan.

It

was this concern with delinquency which led to a review
of the existing social services for children.

Improve­

ments were made, but it was felt that many more services
were needed.

With the recognition of the need for more

services, Governor Harry Kelly appointed the Youth
Guidance Committee of 1943 (Bulletin #342, 1967; Pearman,
1955).

This committee recommended enactment and revision

of many laws for the improvement of educational and social
services to children.

They acknowledged the necessity

for programs to emphasize prevention, and recognized that
there would be children who would not become delinquent
but nevertheless would fail to develop into well-adjusted
citizens unless assistance was provided them.

The visit­

ing teacher program seemed to be the most effective method
for serving these children.

Consequently, P.A. 38,

Public Acts of 1944, Extra Session, was enacted creating
the Visiting Teacher Service in Michigan.
This law provided that:
1.

2.

Two hundred thousand dollars be appropriated for
the fiscal year ending June 30, 1945, for the
purpose of helping school districts and county
boards of supervisors provide programs designed
to prevent and treat behavior problems of
children.
The county board of supervisors be empowered to
establish, through the office of the county
superintendant of schools or the board of
education of any school district, programs for
the prevention and treatment of behavior problems
of children and employment of visiting teachers
and other personnel for this purpose.

38
3.
4.
5.

Special training be required of all persons
employed as visiting teachers (school social
workers).
The unit operating a program under the act be
obligated to include in its annual budget a sum
sufficient for this purpose.
The Superintendent of Public Instruction make a
preliminary report to the legislature as of
January 1, 1945, and an annual report to the
Governor beginning July 1, 1945.
The first-year program was successful and the

legislature continued support of the programs.

As a

result of this support, by 1954, forty-six projects
employing 121 school social workers were in existence
(Pearman, 1955).

During this time, visiting teacher work

was carried on primarily through the mechanism of the
individual interview, and the relationship established
by this was the prime help being offered the child.
literature of the time reflects this approach.

The

It con­

sisted primarily of individual case reports focusing on
the methods of treating selected cases.
In an early study of the responsibilities and
duties of the visiting teacher in Michigan, Joseph B.
Hourihan (1952) recommended that the visiting teacher
limit her work to those children who were emotionally
maladjusted.

He suggested that the visiting teacher

could improve the service, by giving more attention to
referrals to other casework agencies, undertaking more
consultations with teachers with regard to individual
children, and making more extensive use of psychiatric
consultation.

39
As can be seen from the preceding, -there is sig­
nificant disagreement among the professionals about the
role of the school social worker in the public schools.
Much has been attempted in trying to define the role,
and to make the profession of school social work more in
tune with the needs of the school.

Remaining is the

impression that there is still difficulty with the job.
Frank Maple (1973), in a speech to the Midwest School
Social Work Conference in September, 1973, summed up the
position of the school social worker in the schools as
follows:
The workers in the school systems I am familiar
with are:
1. All overloaded
2. Mostly pupil focused
3. Mostly providing direct services to pupils,
teachers, parents
4. Under attack to demonstrate both their value and
their effectiveness
5. Frustrated in attempting to clearly describe what
they do
6. Questioning whether they can or should move to
new modes of functioning
7. Fearful of staff reductions
8. Keenly aware that many teachers and parents do
not understand their function
Act 259 of the Public Acts of 1966 changed the
name of the Visiting Teacher to School Social Worker and
dropped the requirement for a teacher1s certificate.

On

March 31, 1967, the Visiting Teacher Program became the
School Social Work Service; a section of the Department
of Education falling under Special Education Services
(Bulletin #342, 1967 revision).

40
The Role of the School Social
Worker in Michigan
Bulletin #342 (1967) describes the duties of the
school social worker as, "The school social worker,
through a wide variety of assessment and Intervention
techniques, endeavors to help pupils, school staff,
parents, and community to Identify adverse conditions,
needed services, and resources and to plan and execute
programs for and/or with all these groups" (p. 5).

As

can be seen, this is a broad and nondetailed description
of the school social work service.
In 1967 the Midwest Research Center for Pupil
Personnel Service at the University of Michigan (Maple,
1967) assessed the Visiting Teacher Service in Michigan.
The goal of the investigation was to assess how the Visit­
ing Teacher Program was viewed by visiting teachers,
school administrators, teachers, and school diagnosti­
cians.

Questionnaires were administered to 387 visiting

teachers.

In addition, twenty-five principals, twenty-

five teachers, and twenty-five school diagnosticians
responded to the questionnaire.

One section of this study

that is most relevant to the current study was a section
that asked the respondents to assess the role of the
school social worker on the basis of those tasks that
the school social worker should do.

Those same tasks

were assessed on the basis of the respondent's

41
perception of the tasks that the school social workers
do do.

Among the major conclusions of the study were:

(1) A high conformity of practice
(a) by same individual over buildings covered
(b) from individual to individual;
(2) Disagreement regarding role expectations for
visiting teachers as viewed by principals,
teachers, and school diagnosticians;
(3) Little evidence of effort on the part of prac­
titioners to influence the school.4s organizational
pattern;
(4) Little evidence of provision of specific consul­
tative services which meet the identified needs
of teachers;
(5) Little evidence of preventative activities by
practitioners.
In discussing the variance between the should
responses and the do responses of the visiting teachers
and classroom teachers, the report states:
The wide discrepancies among the respondents indi­
cated some need for the clarification of the Visit­
ing Teacher's role to the other personnel in the
school. It may be that their expectations for the
Visiting Teacher are unrealistic in many areas. It
is also possible, however, that the Visiting Teacher
should re-orient himself to perform some of the
functions that the others see as a normal part of
his role.
(Maple, 1967, p. 310)

42
As a direct: result of the Midwest Report (Maple, 1967) ,
the Michigan Department of Education developed a fiveyear study project to assess the role of School Social
Work Service (School Social Work Evaluation Study,
1970-71).

In analyzing the data, the following six

categories were derived.

These represent in decreasing

order the emphasis being placed on varying activities of
the school social worker:
(1) Direct service to pupils
(2) Involvement with teachers
(3) Service to school administration
(4) Pupil personnel services
(5) Involvement with parents
(6) Involvement with community agencies
Again, the emphasis is being placed on direct ser­
vice to children, primarily through the casework approach.
These tasks, as defined by the school social workers in
Michigan, are in substantial agreement with the earlier
work of Costin (1968).

However, as reported in the

Michigan Study, "There was indication that we are moving
away from this casework emphasis and beginning to place
importance on assisting parents with the educational
goals for their children and assisting teachers and
school staff in planning a more appropriate learning
environment" (Maple, 1967, p. 2).

43
As the reader will note, the Michigan program is
in agreement with national trends.

The beginning of

the service in 1944 was the result of a felt need of
the time.

The programs were initially designed to aid

the poverty stricken and alien elements of society.

As

time went on and the needs of all pupils were changing,
school social workers began to shift with the times.

The

feeling of the school social worker was that there was a
need for more service, for more students.

This realization

led to the increase in the numbers of school social workers
and to the involvement in other areas of the child's life.
It is continually interesting to note that while Costin
(1972) is calling for the school social worker to get away
from the role of exclusively being a caseworker and becom­
ing more involved with the school as an institution, the
school social workers of Michigan still rely almost
entirely on the casework approach in resolving the
problems of children.

This raises the question of how

this discrepancy of needs versus actual programming has
been seen by teachers of the emotionally disturbed.
In a study of the role of the school social
worker in relation to programs for the emotionally dis­
turbed in Michigan, Miller (1971) found that:
The school social workers who are servicing children
in classroom programs for the emotionally disturbed
are well qualified for their positions. Their
identification of many areas of need in regard to

44
the special education classroom programs for emo­
tionally disturbed children is an indication of
their basic concern to improve these programs toward
helping them to function at a more optional level.
A large number of the workers have apparently incor­
porated many of the current concepts in the way that
they are rendering service. However, it is also
apparent that some of the social workers have limited
their services to more traditional approaches.
(p. 121)
These more traditional approaches have been almost exclu­
sively the casework, individual therapy approach.
Is There a Problem?
William Morse (1961) in a comprehensive examination
of the mental health movement in the public schools found
that while mental health is the nation's number one health
problem, the number of trained professionals dealing with
mental health in public schools was exceeded by the need.
He explained that while the mental health specialists are
already attempting to aid the teacher, much of their
effort is directed toward explaining their role.

He

(Morse, 1961) concludes that,
Much energy has been and continues to be spent on
verbalizing mental hygiene concepts for teachers.
A good deal of time was spent on how the teacher
should accept the child. The new vistas pointed
up by dynamic psychology were exciting and awe
inspiring to the teacher. Nevertheless the teacher's
major question was still how to manage the child's
behavior. To be told how one should feel did not
solve this problem. As teachers demonstrated to
us again and again, the actual result of such
preachment was less teacher security and less
certainty. Many teachers felt helpless and immo­
bilized. Mental health teaching had reduced their
potency. Specialists (school social workers in

45
this case) often imply that teachers are hostile,
rejecting and vindictive. It is our conviction that
teachers do not have to be told that they should love
children; most of them already do, and if they do
not, admonitions will not make them over. What they
(teachers) do need is direct help to respond in terms
suited to the child's dynamics. They (teachers) ask
for concrete suggestions and are frequently given
platitudes.
(p. 326)
Morse's early indictment of the mental health
movement stands as a bellwether for things to come in the
movement to provide appropriate services to children.
While all have been attempting in their individual ways
to aid children, there seems to have been a lack of com­
munication between and among the various professionals
concerned with the problem.

White (1965) indicates that

"The values advocated by the mental health movement in
the school setting often conflict with educational values"
(p. 198).

She discusses the relationship between edu­

cators and mental health professionals by stating that,
Educators tend to be impressed by professional people
who sound technical and knowledgeable, and are in­
clined to buy their wares as superior to anything
the school cam offer. Educators tend to forget that
the school has some rather good techniques, compared
to the mental health movement, for schools are so
busy defending themselves from public attack that
they get used to being apologetic about even those
things which they do rather well.
(p. 188)
Shaw (1967), in an examination of the delineation
among the roles of various guidance professionals, con­
cluded that,

46
. . . there is a great deal of disagreement within
each of these professions (school counseling, school
social work, and school psychology) with respect to
the roles that a given profession should play.
. . . in addition to disagreement within pro­
fessions, there is profound disagreement among these
three professions, with respect to their specialized
roles within the educational setting. There are
almost no guidance functions which one profession is
willing to delegate to another as being its exclusive
domain. The general issues of who should work with
them, or what they should attempt to accomplish are
not resolved in any clear fashion. Each profession
tends to ascribe to itself the most status-giving
functions.
(p. 10)
What Is the Present Status of Programming
tor Emotionally Disturbed Children in
Michigan with kespect to tKe
School Social worKer
In a statewide survey of programs for the emotion­
ally disturbed, Coleman and Mazzei (1971) found that school
social work was not involved in the initial screening and
assignment of children in 40.0 percent of the cases.

In

addition, 58.5 percent of the respondents did not have an
initial contact with the school social worker relative to
each child prior to placement in the classroom.

On the

average, 56.5 percent of the respondent teachers of the
emotionally disturbed in Michigan met with the school
social worker two or less times per month.

When asked

if the school sodial worker was sufficiently available to
the teacher for consultation, almost 38.0 percent
responded in the negative.
In another statewide survey of programs for
emotionally disturbed children in Michigan, Donaldson

47
and Schaftenaar (1971) requested that teachers describe
their satisfaction with varying aspects of the programming
for disturbed children in their districts*

On those areas

of programming that included the school social worker,
there was general agreement among the respondents that
this was an area that was lacking.

The teachers ranked

the area titled Supportive Provisions, sixth out of seven
categories in their overall satisfaction.

They (teachers)

felt that the service was inadequate, that the parents of
these children were in need of help and were not receiving
it, and that they as teachers were not receiving support
and assistance to meet the personal and emotional needs of
their students.
These statements could very easily be used as an
indictment of the school social work program in Michigan.
However, it is not the intention of this study to do this.
Zt is merely presented as evidence that at the time of the
cited studies, there were difficulties.
In restating the purpose of the present study, it
is the intention of this writer to look at the tasks of
the school social worker and assess if there is a dif­
ference in the way teachers of the emotionally disturbed
and school social workers perceive the presented tasks,
and if there is a desire on the part of either to have
things different in the real world than what is presently
available.

CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY INTRODUCTION

This chapter deals with the methodology used in
obtaining the data.

Included are sections dealing with

the general design of the study, the subjects, selection
of the sample, demographic data, the questionnaire, the
factor score, hypotheses, collection of the data, and
analysis of the data.
General Design of the Study
It is not the intention of this study to define
or describe the role of the school social worker in
Michigan.

These rules and guidelines are being promul­

gated by the State Department of Education, and are
receiving input from all of the various individuals
involved in the program.

It is, however, important to

ascertain whether there is any discrepancy in the way
the roles of the school social worker are being perceived
by the principal individuals in the public schools with
whom this study is concerned, namely the school social
worker and the teacher of the emotionally impaired.

48

49
In this study a selected group of school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired were
asked to look at a series of behaviorally stated
descriptions of school social worker job responsibilities.
They were asked to state the priority which they perceived
each task to have in their actual situations, and the
priority which they would assign each task under ideal
conditions.

The responses of the teachers are compared

to the responses of the school social workers in order to
determine the differences and the similarities in the per­
ceptions of the two groups.
Subjects
The pppulation from which the data for this study
were derived included the total number of school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in the
state of Michigan.

It is important to note that the popu­

lation excludes all social workers and teachers who may be
employed in the private sector:

hospitals, correctional

institutions, and other private schools and clinics.
Social Workers
This title refers to those social workers who are
employed by local and intermediate school districts
throughout the state of Michigan.

These persons meet

the state requirements for either full or temporary
approval by the State Department of Education as a school

50
social worker.

Each of these individuals function in a

program which is reimbursed by the state.

There are 798

school workers in this group.
Teachers of the Emotionally
This title refers to all those who are employed in
the public school systems in the state of Michigan as
teachers of the emotionally impaired.

This includes

those who are working along a broad continuum of pro­
vision of services to identified emotionally impaired
children, including:

teachers in a self-contained class­

room, resource room teachers, teacher consultants, and in
some instances supervisors of groups of teachers.

They

all meet the requirements for either temporary or full
approval by the Michigan Department of Education and
function in programs which are reimbursed by the state.
There are 563 teachers in this group.
Selection of the Sample
From lists supplied by the State Department of
Education, Special Education Services, a random sample
of 125 teachers of the emotionally impaired and 125
school social workers was selected.

Questionnaires were

mailed to this sample.
A total of 161 (64.4 percent) completed question­
naires were returned.

Two of these had to be excluded

51
because the respondent had apparently misunderstood the
directions and not filled in a complete section.

The

response rate was higher than this percentage would indi­
cate since twenty-one questionnaires were returned by
Directors of Special Education because the individual
had left the district and no forwarding address was
available.
This left a total of 159 completed questionnaires
for use in the analysis:

eighty-nine school social workers

and seventy teachers of the emotionally impaired.
Demographic Data
In an attempt to more fully describe the sample,
an extensive demographic section was included in the
questionnaire.

Information was secured regarding length

of time in profession, professional employment history,
type and place of undergraduate and graduate education,
length of time in field work placement, professionalpupil ratio, length of time involved in programs for the
emotionally impaired, and questions concerning feelings
regarding programming for emotionally impaired children
were asked.

Results of the demographic section of the

questionnaire (see Appendices B and C) will be presented
at this time in order to aid the reader in assessing the
nature of the sample of teachers and school social
workers.

52
Demographic Data— School
Social workers
Number of Years as a School
Social Worker
Act 259, P.A. 1966, changed the name of the Visit
ing Teacher Program to School Social Work, and dropped the
requirement of a teacher's certificate.

As of March 31,

1967, the Visiting Teacher Program became the School Social
Work Service, a part of local and state planning and one
of the pupil personnel services for children.

As can be

seen by Table 2, 37 percent of the school social worker
sample have been functioning as school social workers for
at least eight years or more.

This fact coupled with the

change in requirements in 1967 allows us to assume that
this number (37 percent) has a teacher's certificate.
Sixty-three percent of the sample have less than eight
years of school social work experience.

r

“ * nee

'

Table 2 also illustrates the average number of
years experience in the present district as between six
and seven.

Of the school social workers, 47.2 percent

had been in their present district over six years.
Professional Employment History
Miller (1971) found that 33.78 percent of his
sample had social work experience only.

This compares

53

TABLE 2
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING TO:
(A) NUMBER OF YEARS AS A SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER;
(B) NUMBER OF YEARS EMPLOYED AS SCHOOL
SOCIAL WORKER IN PRESENT
SCHOOL DISTRICT
Number of
Years

Years in
Present District

Years as
School Social Worker
N

% of Sample

*

N

% of Sample

0- 2

7

7.9

12

13.5

3- 4

14

15.7

18

20.2

5- 6

19

21.4

17

19.1

7- 8

16

18.0

19

21.3

9-10

12

13.5

9

10.1

11-12

6

6.7

4

4.5

13-14

4

4.4

3

3.4

15-16

2

2.3

2

2.2

17-18

5

5.6

4

4.5

19-20

1

1.1

1

1.1

21-22

1

1.1

0

0

23-24

0

0

0

0

25-26

2

2.3

0

0

*

Due to rounding, percentage of Sample may not
total 100 percent.

*

54
with the 32.58 percent of the present sample which had
social work related experience only.

Miller found that

66.21 percent had social work and school related exper­
ience, while the present investigation found that
53.93 percent of the population had a combination of
social work and school related experiences.

The third

category not included in the Miller study was that of
only school related experience.

There were 13.48 percent

in this category which included classroom teaching, coun­
seling, and other school related experiences only.

See

Table 3.
TABLE 3
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING TO
PROFESSIONAL EMPLOYMENT HISTORY
Employment History

N

% of Sample

School Related Only

12

13.48

Social Work Related Only

29

32.58

School and Social Work Related

48

53.93

Undergraduate Major
As can be seen by Table 4 (p. 55), 44.94 percent
of the school social workers had an undergraduate back­
ground in education.

55
TABLE 4
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO UNDERGRADUATE MAJOR
Undergraduate Major

N

Education
Sociology
Psychology
Social Work
Speech
Other

40
18
16
6
4
5

% of Sample
44.94
20.22
17.97
6.74
4.49
5.64

Universities Attended
In assessing Table 5 (p. 56), it is important to
note that the majority of school social workers did most
of their work in major universities in Michigan.
Graduate Education
One can see from Table 6 (p. 57) that the largest
percentage of school social workers, 56.17 percent,
received their graduate degree in School Social Work,
while 25.84 percent of the school social workers received
a combination of social work and education courses.
Field Work Training
As indicated in Table 7 (p. 57), 56.17 percent
of the school social workers received their field work
experience in places other than in the schools.

56

TABLE 5
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO UNIVERSITIES ATTENDED
Graduate

Undergraduate
University
N

% of Sample

% of Sample

N

13

14.60

28

31.46

8

8.98

27

30.33

11

12.35

18

20.22

Western Michigan

6

6.74

2

2.24

Central Michigan

8

8.98

1

1.12

University of Detroit

3

3.37

1

1.12

10

11.23

0

0

2

2.24

0

0

Other In State

10

11.23

0

0

Other Out of State

18

20.22

8

8.98

Wayne State
University of Michigan
Michigan State

Eastern Michigan
Grand Valley State
College

Note. Four school social workers did not attend
graduate school.

57

TABLE 6
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO AREAS OF GRADUATE COURSE WORK
Course Work Areas

N

% of Sample

Masters in Social Work

50

56.17

Masters of Arts in Education Only

14

15.73

Social Work and Education

23

25.84

2

2.25

Other

TABLE 7
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO FIELD WORK TRAINING SETTINGS
Training Setting

N

% of Sample

Public School Only

13

14.60

Combination Public School and Other

26

29.21

Other, Non-Public School

50

56.17

58
Number of Months Spent in
---- -----Field Work
Of the sample, 62.92 percent spent one year or
less in field work training, the remainder spending more
than one year in field work training.
School Social Work/Pupil

R a t i o -----

----

The average student/school social worker ratio is
2,842 to 1.

The distribution is illustrated in Table 8.
TABLE 8

DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO STUDENT/SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER RATIO
Pupil/S.S.W. Ratio

N

(1-1,000)
(1,001-2,000)
(2,001-3,000)
(3,001-4,000)
(4,001-5,000)
(5,001-6,000)
(6,001-7,000)

2
27
30
15
11
3
1

:1
:1
:1
:1
:1
:1
:1

Number of Buildings Served
fey School Social workers
Table 9 (p. 59) illustrates the average number
of buildings served by the sample of school social
workers as 5.17.

59
TABLE 9
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO THE NUMBER OF BUILDINGS SERVED
Number of Buildings

% of Sample

N

1-5

62

69.65

6-10

21

24.58

11-15

4

4.48

16-20

2

2.24

Hours/Week Planning
The average number of hours per week spent plan­
ning by the school social worker is 4.32.
Percentage of Time Spent with
Programs for the Emotionally
Impaired
Of the school social workers, 67.14 percent indi­
cated that they spent from 1-25 percent of their time with
programs for the emotionally impaired.

See Table 10

(p. 60).
Appropriate Percentage of Time
Spent with Programs for the
Emotionally
Fifty-five percent of the school social workers
felt that they spend an appropriate amount of time work­
ing with programs for the emotionally impaired.
Table 11 (p. 60).

See

60

TABLE 10
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE ACCORDING
TO AMOUNT OF TIME SPENT WITH PROGRAMS FOR
EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
% of Time

N

% of Sample

0-25

60

67.41

26-50

16

17.94

51-75

6

6.74

76-100

7

7.86

TABLE 11
DISTRIBUTION OF SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER SAMPLE FEELINGS
REGARDING THE AMOUNT OF TIME SPENT WITH PROGRAMS
FOR THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
Adequate Time Spent

N

% of Sample

Yes

49

55.05

No

40

44.94

61
Opportunity for Spending More
Time with Programs tor
Emotionally Impaired
When asked whether they would like to spend more
or less time with programs for emotionally impaired,
68 percent of the school social worker sample responded
that they would like to spend more time, 11.23 percent
responded less time, and 20.22 percent responded that
they were spending enough time.
Sex of Respondents
Of the eighty-nine responding school social
workers, thirty-three, or 37.07 percent, were males and
fifty-six, or 62.92 percent, were females.
Summary of School Social
Worker Demographic Data
One of the interesting things that developed out
of the International Research Center for Pupil Personnel
Service (IRCOPPS) study (1967) was the following char­
acterization of the visiting teacher of 1967.
A woman who has been a visiting teacher for about
five years and is between the ages of 50 and 60.
She has been in the same school district throughout
her visiting teacher career and she has full
approval. She was previously a classroom teacher
and has had three previous jobs. Her undergraduate
major was education and she went to a small college
in the midwest to obtain this degree. She received
her masters in education and has one additional year
in social work. She received her graduate work at
the University of Michigan and her field placement
was at a family service agency.

62
The data of the IRCOPPS study (1967) also pro­
vides a profile of what one might expect of the visiting
teacher in the future, based on the characteristics of
the less experienced visiting teacher.
A woman who has between 0 and 3 years service and
is between 30 and 40 years of age. She has been in
the same school district throughout her visiting
teacher career and she has full approval. She has
prior experience as a classroom teacher and this
is her third job. Her undergraduate major was in
education and she attended a small midwestern col­
lege. She has a masters in education and one addi­
tional year in the school of social work. She
received her graduate training at Wayne State Uni­
versity and did her field work placement in a
school setting.
The following is a composite of the school social
worker from the present study:

(Figures are based on

the mean of each category.)
A woman who has been a school social worker for
over eight years, and has been employed in her pre­
sent district for just over seven years. She has
had both classroom teaching experience and school
counseling experience, and has also been employed
as a social worker in a clinical, correctional or
recreational setting. She received her under­
graduate training at one of the major state uni­
versities in Michigan, majoring in education. Her
graduate education was received at either Wayne
State, Michigan State or University of Michigan,
where she majored in social Work and received her
masters in Social Work. During her graduate edu­
cation, she spent one year in a field experience
setting outside of the public schools. She did
not enter the public schools professionally until
she was employed by them.
She works in a system where the school social
worker/pupil ratio is 1/2,842. She serves five
buildings in her district and allows herself
4.3 hours per week for planning and writing. She
spends between 0 and 25% of her time involved with
programs for the emotionally impaired, which she

63
feels is an appropriate amount of time under the
given conditions. She feels, however, that if con­
ditions were changed, she would like to spend more
time in programs for the emotionally impaired.
Demographic Data— Teachers of the
Emotionally impaired
Classroom vs. Non-Classroom
Teacher
Seventy percent of the respondents describe themselves as classroom teachers, stating that they work
with a certain group of children throughout the day,
and that they are primarily responsible for their chil­
dren's educational development.

Thirty percent of the

respondents describe themselves as nonclassroom teachers,
stating that most of the children they work with are
enrolled in other teacher's classrooms.
___

^

Mi

t ^

m

J

m

....

^

The average number of buildings served by the
nonclassroom teachers is two.

Eighty percent of the non­

classroom teachers serve no more than two buildings.
However, 20 percent of the respondents serve over two
buildings on a regular basis.
Experience as a Teacher of
the Emotionally Impaired
The average number of years experience as a
teacher of the emotionally impaired was slightly more
than four years.

See Table 12.

64
TABLE 12
DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER FOR THE EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO YEARS EXPERIENCE
AS A TEACHER FOR THE EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
Number of Years

K)

+
1
*

0 -2

GO

ot

+
l

4+—6
8+-10
Over 10
Note.

N
22
24
10
5
5
4

% of Sample
31.43
34.28
14.28
7.14
7.14
5.71

5? * 4+ years

Undergraduate Major
A majority of the teachers of the emotionally
impaired in this sample (54.28 percent) received an
undergraduate degree in the education of the emotionally
impaired.

The remaining 45.71 percent of the sample were

split between elementary education (15.71 percent),
secondary education (21.43 percent), education of the
mentally handicapped (7.14 percent), and social work
(1.43 percent) as illustrated in Table 13 (p. 65).
Highest Level of Education
Attained
Of the sample, forty-two, or 60 percent, have at
least a minimum of a masters degree, with thirty-two, or
45.71 percent, having that masters degree in special

65
education.

Of the teachers, 22.86 percent had attained

only a B.A. or B.S. degree.

The entire group of teachers

who listed that the highest level of education attained
as a B.A. or B.S. were from the group that had as an
undergraduate degree, a major in the area of the emotion­
ally impaired.

In addition, nine of the twelve respon­

dents who had less than an M.A. said that they had an
undergraduate major in the area of emotionally impair­
ment.

This means that of the total population of respon­

dents with an Emotionally Impaired major, twenty-five, or
65.78 percent, had attained less than an M.A. degree.
See Table 14 (p. 66).
TABLE 13
DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER OF THE EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED SAMPLE ACCORDING TO
UNDERGRADUATE MAJOR
Major
Emotionally Impaired
Elementary Education
Secondary Education
Mentally Impaired
Social Work

N
38
11

15
5
1

% of Sample
54.28
15.71
21.43
7.14
1.43

66
TABLE 14
DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHER FOR EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
SAMPLE ACCORDING TO THE HIGHEST LEVEL OF
EDUCATION ATTAINED
Degree
B *A *, B.S.
M.A. , M.S. (Reg. Ed.)
M.A., M.S. (Spec. Ed.)
M.S., M.S. (Other)
Less than M.A.

% of Sample

N
16
8
32
2
12

22.86
11.43
45.71
2.86
17.14

Student Teaching or Practicum
Setting
As can be seen in Table 15 (p. 67), thirty-six of
the teachers did their student teaching or received their
practicum training in the public schools.
Availability of School
Social Work Service*
Thirty-eight or 54.28 percent of the teachers
felt that school social work service was sufficiently
available to them, while thirty-two or 45.71 percent felt
that it was not.
Estimation of Number of School
Social Work Contacts
This question was not answered by many of the
respondents.

They commented that they didn't understand

the content of the word, "would."

That is, they esti­

mated in some cases that this would be the ideal of

67
having a school social worker anywhere from every hour
on the hour to, "given the school social worker that I
have now, I don't care if I ever see them.”

It was

decided not to report this question in the present study
as the results are not in a form useful for this study.
TABLE 15
DISTRIBUTION OF THE TEACHERS FOR EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED
SAMPLE ACCORDING TO STUDENT TEACHING OR
PRACTICUM SETTING
Setting
Self-Contained
Resource Room
Mental Institution
Correctional
Other

N
29
7
25
7
2

% of Sample
41.43
10.00
35.71
10.00
2.86

Summary of Demographic Data on
Teachers of the Emotionally
impairecT
In an attempt to help the reader characterize
this population, the following composite was prepared.
This is a composite of the teachers of the emotionally
impaired in the sample.
She has been a classroom teacher working with a
group of children throughout the day for just over
four years. Her undergraduate major was in special
education with an emphasis in the area of emotional
impairment. She has gone on to school during the
last four years and has received a masters degree
in special education. During her school years, she
did a practicum or a student teaching assignment

68
in a public school self-contained classroom. Now
that she is in her own classroom, she feels that she
sees the school social worker a sufficient number
of times throughout the year for consultation
regarding individual children in her classroom.
Questionnaire
The questionnaires are divided into two parts (see
Appendices B and 0 for the complete questionnaires).

The

second part of each questionnaire is the General Infor­
mation section, referred to earlier in this chapter as the
demographic data.

The first part of each questionnaire

consists of the rating scales described below.
Tasks of the School Social
Worker
The "Tasks" section of the questionnaire includes
eighty-one behaviorally stated items descriptive of school
social worker activities.

(They number eighty-two items

because items 3 and 21 are the same on the basis of a
typographical error.)
descriptors.

These items are referred to as task

These task descriptors were originated by

Costin (1968) and were designed to encompass the primary
responsibilities of the school social worker in the United
States.

On the basis of a factor analysis, Costin deter­

mined that the variance in the interrelationships among
the items could be accounted for by nine factors.

These

nine factors are described in detail in the review of
the Costin study in Chapter II.

The nine factors may be

69
considered as broad areas of school social worker
functions.

These factors are listed below with the

abbreviated name of each factor, used for convenience
in later tables, included in parentheses.
(1) Leadership and Policy Making (Leadership)
(2) Casework Services to Parents and Child (Casework)
(3) Clinical Treatment for Children (Clinical)
(4) Educational Counseling to Parents and Child
(Education)
(5) Liaison Between Family and Community Agencies
(Liaison)
(6) Interpreting the Child to the Teacher (Inter­
preting Child)
(7) Personal Service to the Teacher (Personal Service
to the Teacher)
(8) Interpreting School Social Work Services (Inter­
preting SSW)
(9) Caseload Management (Caseload)
Each of these nine factors is measured by a set
of task descriptors; that is, each of the eighty-one task
descriptors is subsumed under one of the factors.

The

task descriptors clustered under each factor are listed
in Appendix D.

70
In the questionnaire the items (task descriptors)
were randomly assigned a position in the questionnaire
in an attempt to discourage the development of a response
set which might have occurred had items relating to one
factor been clustered together.
The two rating scales for each item, the Ideal
scale and the Actual scale are referred to as Conditions.
In the Ideal Condition the respondent is asked to think
of himself as having the responsibility for creating an
ideal school social work program.

For each task statement

he is asked to assign the priority which he believes would
apply in his ideal program.

He is to cross out the number

which he feels best describes the priority he would assign
each task in his ideal program.
LO
1

HI
2

3

4

5

6

The number 1 is the lowest priority a task can have; the
number 6, the highest priority.

An even number of points

on the rating scale was selected to insure that there
would be at least a minimum directionality to the
responses given; that is, the scale has no midpoint.
In the Actual Condition the respondent is asked
to assign a priority which he believes through his

71
experience to be representative of the actual priorities
being assigned to each of the tasks by school social
workers in his district.
The Factor Score
The ratings of the items subsumed under a factor
were summed to give a score for that factor.

However,

before the summation occurred the item rating was trans­
formed to reflect the contribution of that item to the
factor as determined in the original Costin study (1968).
The item rating was multiplied by a weighting factor for
that item derived from the factor analysis performed by
Costin.

Thus, for example, if an item had a weighting

of .67 for its contribution to the factor. Leadership and
Policy Making, and a respondent gave a priority of 5 to
the item, the 5 was multiplied by .67 to yield a score
for that item of 3.35.

This method of transforming item

values utilizing information from a preceding factor
analysis is explained more fully in Rummell (1970).
The final scores used in the analysis of the data
are the factor means, which are the means for a group, of
the sums of those weighted item scores contributing to
that factor.

72
Hypotheses
The writer is not predicting whether differences
will occur or the direction of the differences.

The

issues with which he is concerned will be tested by the
following null hypotheses.
Hypothesis 1 ;
There will be no significant difference between school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally
impaired in Michigan as to their perception of the
importance of nine selected social worker activities
as measured by eighty-one task descriptors.
Hypothesis 2 :
There will be no significant difference in the per­
ception of the importance between nine Ideal and
Actual school social worker activities (as measured
by eighty-one task descriptors) for school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan.
Hypothesis 3 ;
There will be no significant differential effects
(Interaction) between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan
(Groups) and the Ideal and Actual responses
(Measures) on the task descriptors of school social
worker activities over nine selected factors.
Collection of Data
On December 13, 1974, a letter was mailed to the
Directors of Special Education of the selected school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired
telling them that they would be receiving a bundle of

73
questionnaires.

Their cooperation was requested by the

Director of the Michigan Department of Education, Special
Education Services.

(See Appendix E for copy of letter.)

On January 2, 1975, bundles of questionnaires
were mailed to both intermediate and local directors of
special education throughout the state.

This procedure

was followed because of the unavailability of individual
names and addresses of potential respondents.

These

directors were requested to distribute the questionnaires
to the listed school social workers or teachers for the
emotionally impaired.

(See Appendix F for copy of letter.)

On or about January 2, 1975, each respondent
received from his director of special education an
envelope.

Each envelope contained a cover letter explain­

ing the purpose of the study along with some brief expla­
nation.

In addition, each envelope contained a stamped,

self-addressed envelope, a piece of candy, and a pen
which was to be used by the respondent and then offered
as a reward for the completion of the questionnaire.
It has been suggested that the rate of return of
this instrument, approximately 64 percent, was exception­
ally high considering the population.

It is important

to note that three possible explanations for this are
feasible.

One, the initial cover letter to the directors

was under the letterhead of the Michigan Department of
Education.

This added an authoritative touch.

Two, the

74
respondents received the questionnaire directly from their
director of special education, thus adding an additional
impetus for responding.

Third, the inclusion of the

candy and the pen may have influenced the respondents.

The reaction to the pen and candy appeared in the form of
comments from the respondents.

The following is a ran­

domly selected series of comments from some of the respon­
dents regarding the pen and candy:
sure liked the idea of the pen."

"It's not much, but I
"In all honesty, I

probably wouldn't have completed this if it weren't for
the candy."

"The damn pen didn't work."
Analysis of Data

In order to test the three hypotheses, a multi­
variate analysis of variance repeated measures design was
employed.

This was followed by appropriate post hoc pro­

cedures to assess the significance of the magnitude of
any difference which emerged.
For the remainder of the data, summative and per­
centage statistics were used.
A Percentage Score for
Means
It is important to note that factor means cannot
be compared with each other because there are a different
number of items contributing to each factor, and because
the individual item ratings are changed in value by their
weighting factors.

75
However, it was desired to compare the factor
means in order to rank them in order of the priorities
assigned them.

To do this a formula for transforming

these means so that direct comparisons could be made was
developed.

The method used was to determine the percentage

of the highest possible mean score that an obtained factor
mean score represented, taking into account the weighting
factors of the items contributing to the mean factor score
and the differing number of items for each factor.
A description of the steps involved in determining
this percentage will make clear the meaning of this per­
centage score.
First, the highest possible value and the lowest
possible value each item could have was determined by
multiplying the scores of 6 and 1 by each item weighting.
These values were then summed for those items contributing
to a factor, yielding the highest and the lowest possible
mean values for that factor.

Subtracting the lowest from

the highest possible score gives the range of possible
mean scores.
The next step was to determine how high in this
range of scores the obtained factor mean fell by subtract­
ing the obtained factor mean from the highest possible
mean.

Thus, for example, if the highest possible mean

factor score was 30, the lowest possible score was 10
(making a range of 20) and the obtained mean was 20,

76
then the obtained mean was "half-way through" the range,
or 50 percent of a possible "perfect" score.
The percentage score produced by this procedure
is derived from the following formula:
(H - L) — (H
Percentage Score for a Factor =• ----- ^

X)
-

H * highest possible mean score for that factor
L ** lowest possible mean score for that factor
X = obtained mean for that factor
These percentages scores were then used to permit
direct comparisons of the factors and thus their rank
ordering.

CHAPTER IV
FINDINGS

The individual responses to each task descriptor,
grouped by factors for each condition (Ideal-Actual) are
presented in Appendix G.

These data allow the interested

reader to observe the findings item by item.
In testing the three major hypotheses of the
study, the factor means are used.

These factor means for

teachers and school social workers for the Ideal and Actual
Conditions and the probabilities derived from post hoc
analyses comparing teachers and social workers are pre­
sented in Table 16.
The results of the multivariate analysis of
variance for repeated measures are presented in Table 17.
The three hypotheses are tested by the two main effecta
and the interaction displayed in this table.

They will

be discussed in order.
Hypothesis 1— (Group Main Effect) :
There will be no significant differences between
School Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotion­
ally Impaired in Michigan as to their perception of
the importance of nine selected School Social Worker
activities as measured by eighty-one task descriptors.
77

TABLE 16
FACTOR MEANS UNDER IDEAL AND ACTUAL CONDITIONS FOR TEACHERS OF THE EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED AND SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS
Actual

Ideal
Factor
Teacher

Social
Worker

**
P

Teacher

Social
Worker

P

Leadership

37.11

43.76

.0001*

25.09

26.41

.3511

Casework

39.08

41.30

.0013*

29.90

35.92

.0001*

Education

32.43

31.65

.4189

25.15

28.28

.0039*

Personal Service
to the Teacher

13.26

14.29

.0571

8.25

10.66

.0001*

Caseload

17.20

17.76

.2048

13.88

16.02

.0001*

Interpreting SSW.

19.18

20.30

.0298*

14.02

16.92

.0001*

Liaison

18.45

18.41

.9191

14.48

16.11

.0020*

Interpreting the
Child

10.99

12.06

.0005*

8.48

10.11

.0001*

Clinical

14.07

14.24

.6412

10.36

12.71

.0001*

*p < .05
p values are based on the post hoc comparisons of factor mews.

79
TABLE 17
MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE REPEATED MEASURES
Sources of Variation

df

F-ratio

Group— (SSW* *-TEI* ** )

1

8.6564

.0001*

Condition— (Ideal-Actual)

1

67.6682

.0001*

Interaction

1

10.4288

.0001*

P <

*p < .05
♦H

***

SSW— School Social Worker
TEI— Teacher of the Emotionally Impaired

In this hypothesis (p. 77), the group independent
variable (N = 159) had two levels, school social workers
(n = 89) and teachers of the emotionally impaired (n * 70).
The dependent variables were the nine factors with two
levels (Ideal-Actual), as measured by eighty-one task
descriptors.
As can be seen in Table 17, the test of Hypothesis 1
produced an F-ratio for the equality of means of 8.6564
which was significant at the .0001 level.

We were there­

fore able to reject the null hypothesis and conclude that
there are significant differences between school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
Michigan, in the way they perceive the importance of the

80
nine selected school social worker activities (Factors)
as measured by the eighty-one task descriptors.
Hypothesis 2— (Condition Main Effect) :
There will be no significant difference in the per­
ception of the priorities assigned between nine Ideal
and nine Actual School Social Worker activities as
measured by eighty-one task descriptors for School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally
Impaired in Michigan.
To test this hypothesis, we looked at the depen­
dent variables simultaneously to assess the difference
between the respondent's perception of the Ideal and the
Actual Conditions.

The Condition independent variable

had two levels. Ideal and Actual.

The dependent variables

were the nine Factors as measured by the eighty-one task
descriptors.
As caui be seen in Table 17, the test of Hypothe­
sis 2 produced an F-ratio for the equality of means of
67.6682 which was significant at the .0001 level.

We

are able to reject the null hypothesis and conclude that
there are significant differences in the perception of
the importance between nine Ideal and nine Actual school
social worker activities as measured by eighty-one task
descriptors for school social workers and teachers of the
emotionally impaired in Michigan.

81
Hypothesis 3— (Interaction) :
There will be no significant differential effects
(Interaction) between School Social Workers and
Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired in Michigan
(Groups) and the Ideal and Actual responses (Con­
dition) of nine selected School Social Worker
activities as measured by eighty-one task descriptors.
In order to test this hypothesis, we looked for
differential effects between group membership (School
Social Worker— Teacher of the Emotionally Impaired) and
the condition variable (Ideal-Actual) as measured by
eighty-one task descriptors.

As can be seen in Table 17,

the results of this test produced an F-ratio of 10.4288
with p < .0001.

We are able to reject the null hypothesis

and conclude that there are differential effects between
group membership and the Ideal and Actual Conditions
within the nine factors as measured by the eighty-one
task descriptors.
Post Hoc Comparisons
Since the multivariate analysis of variance
yielded significant main effects and significant inter­
action, it was appropriate to carry out post hoc analyses
to locate the factors that discriminated between the two
groups under the two response conditions.
The post hoc univariate analyses for the dif­
ferences between school social workers and teachers of

82
the emotionally impaired for the Ideal Condition are
presented in Table 18 and for the Actual Condition in
Table 19.
In the following discussion each of the compari­
sons will be stated as a null hypothesis, the univariate
analyses appropriate to the hypotheses will be repeated
(from Tables 18 and 19) and a figure will be presented that
graphically portrays the interaction. Groups X Conditions.
An interaction is present when there is a significant dif­
ference between the two groups under one condition but
not under the others.
Hypothesis A l ;
There will be no significant difference between
School Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotion­
ally Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Leadership and Policy Making in the
Ideal condition as measured by eighty-one task
descriptors.
Hypothesis A 2 :
There will be no significant difference between
School Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotion­
ally Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Leadership and Policy Making in the
Actual condition as measured by eighty-one task
descriptors.
As can be seen in Figure 1 (p. 85), there was an
ordinal interaction between the Ideal and the Actual Con­
ditions.

School social workers saw the importance of

Leadership in the Ideal Condition as having more priority

83

TABLE 18
POST HOC UNIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN
SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND TEACHERS OF THE EMOTION­
ALLY IMPAIRED IN MICHIGAN IN THEIR PERCEPTION
OF THE PRIORITIES ASSIGNED TO FACTORS IN
THE IDEAL CONDITION
Variable
Leadership and
Policy Making
Casework Services to
Parents and Child
Educational Counseling
to Parents and Child

Mean Square

Univariate F

P <

1732.7039

23.9438

.0001

191.9173

10.8540

.0013

23.6426

.6570

.4189

A

Personal Service
to the Teacher

41.7140

3.6754

.0571

Caseload Management

12.2867

1.6215

.0248

Interpreting School
Social Work Services

49.6926

4.8129

.0298

Liaison Between Family
and Community Agencies

.0632

.0104

.9191

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

44.8609

12.8922

.0005

1.1347

.2181

.6412

Clinical Treatment
for Children

Note. It is important to note that the df in
each of these cases is 1.

84

TABLE 19
POST HOC UNIVARIATE ANALYSIS OF THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN
SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS AND TEACHERS OF THE EMOTION­
ALLY IMPAIRED IN MICHIGAN IN THEIR PERCEPTION OF
THE PRIORITIES ASSIGNED TO FACTORS IN THE
ACTUAL CONDITION
Variable
Leadership and
Policy Making

Mean Square

Univariate F

P <

68.2050

.8750

.3511

1418.1884

38.4413

.0001

Educational Counseling
to Parents and Child

383.7152

8.5873

.0039

Personal Service to
the Teacher

227.3907

24.5355

.0001

Caseload Management

178.6145

19.1693

.0001

Interpreting School
Social Work Services

331.5047

22.3337

.0001

Liaison Between Family
and Community Agencies

104.0192

9.9188

.0020

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

104.4277

17.8964

.0001

Clinical Treatment
for Children

215.8751

28.1958

.0001

Casework Services to
Parents and Child

Note. It is important to note that the df * to
1 in each of the cases.

85

Variable

Condition

Leadership and
Policy Making

IDEAL
ACTUAL

Factor
Means

Mean Square
1732.7039
68.2050

Univariate F
29.9438
.8750

.0001
.3511

45 -43.76
40 -37.11 ■v
35 -■
30 --

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 1. Difference between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to leadership
and policy making in both the Ideal and the Actual con­
dition.

*

86
than did teachers.

The difference between school social

workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in the
Actual Condition was not significant.
He can reject the first null hypothesis and conclude
that there are differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in their perception
of the importance of Leadership and Policy Making in the
Ideal Condition.

He are unable to reject the second null

hypothesis.
Hypothesis B 1 :
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Horkers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Casework Services to the Child and his Parents in the
Ideal condition.
Hypothesis B2 s
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Horkers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Casework Services to the Child and his Parents in the
Actual condition.
As can be seen in Figure 2, there was no interaction
between the Ideal and the Actual for the two groups.

He

are able to reject the null hypothesis in both cases and
conclude that there is a difference between school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in the
way they perceive the importance of Casework Services to
the Child and his Parents in both the Ideal and the Actual

87

Variable

Condition

Casework Ser­
vices to the
Child and His
Parents

IDEAL
ACTUAL

Factor
Means

Mean Square
191.9173
1418.1884

Univariate F
10.8540
38.4413

.0003
.0001

45 -40 --

41.30
39.08
35.92

35
29.90

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 2. Difference between school social worker
and the teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan
in their perception of the priorities assigned to casework
services to the child and his parents in both the Ideal
and Actual condition.

88
Condition.

It is important to note that in both con­

ditions, the school social workers placed more importance
on the factor than did the teachers of the emotionally
impaired.
Hypothesis C l t
There will be no significant differences between
School Social Horkers and Teachers of the Emotionally
impaired in their perception of priorities assigned
to Educational Counseling to Parents and Child in the
Ideal condition as measured by eighty-one task
descriptors.
Hypothesis C 2 :
There will be no significant differences between
School Social Horkers and Teachers of the Emotionally
Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Educational Counseling to Parents and
Child in the Actual condition as measured by eightyone task descriptors.
As can be seen in Figure 3, there is an interaction
between school social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired and the Ideal and the Actual Conditions.

He

are able to reject the second null hypothesis and conclude
that there are differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in the way they
perceive the priorities that are actually being assigned
to Educational Counseling to Parents and Child.

By not

being able to reject the hypothesis in the first condition
(Ideal), we can conclude that teachers and school social
workers are in agreement as to the priorities that should

89

Variable

Condition

Mean Square

Univariate F

Educational
Counseling of
Parents and
Child

IDEAL
ACTUAL

23.6426
383.7152

.6570
8.5873

Factor
Means

.4189*
.0039

35 ■■
32.43
31.65
30 -28.28
25.15

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 3. Difference between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to educational
counseling to parents and child in both the Ideal and
Actual condition.

90
be assigned bo Educational Counseling to Parents and
Child in the Ideal Condition.
Hypothesis D l ;
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally
Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Personal Service to the Teacher in the
Ideal condition.
Hypothesis D 2 :
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally
Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Personal Service to the Teacher in the
Actual condition.
Illustrated in Figure 4 is an interaction between
school social workers and teachers of the emotionally
impaired and the Ideal and Actual Conditions.

We are

unable to reject the null hypothesis in the first instance
and must conclude that there are no differences between
school social workers and teachers of the emotionally
impaired in the way they perceive the priorities assigned
to Personal Service to the Teacher in the Ideal Condition.
We are able to reject the null hypothesis of no differences
in the Actual Condition and can conclude that school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired see the
priorities being assigned to Personal Service to the
Teacher differently.

91

Variable

Condition

Personal Ser­
vice to the
Teacher

IDEAL
ACTUAL

15 -10

Mean Square
41.7140
227.3907

Univariate F
3.6754
24.5355

.0571,
.0001

14.29
13.26
10.66

"

8.25

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 4. Differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to personal
service to the teacher in both the Ideal and the Actual
condition.

92
Hypothesis E l ;
There will be no significant differences between
School Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotion­
ally Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Caseload Management in the Ideal con­
dition.
Hypothesis F 2 :
There will be no significant differences between
School Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotion­
ally Impaired in their perception of the priorities
assigned to Caseload Management in the Actual con­
dition.
As can be seen in Figure 5, there is an interaction
between School social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired and the Ideal and the Actual Conditions.
The hypothesis of no differences in the perception of the
Ideal Condition as it relates to Caseload Management cannot
be rejected.

The hypothesis of no differences in the Actual

Condition was rejected and it was concluded that there is
a significant difference between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in their perceptions
of the priorities assigned to Caseload Management in the
Actual Condition.

School social workers saw this activity

as having more priority assigned to it in the Actual Con­
dition them did the teachers of the emotionally impaired.
Hypothesis F I :
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Interpreting School Social Work Services in the Ideal
condition.

93

Condition

Variable

IDEAL
ACTUAL

Caseload
Management

Mean Square
12.2867
178.6145

Univariate F
1.6215
19.1693

SSW

Ji
.2048,
.0001

16.02
13.88

10

-

IDEAL
Fig. 5. Differences between school
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
their perception of the priorities assigned
management in both the Ideal and the Actual

ACTUAL
social workers
Michigan in
to caseload
condition.

94
Hypothesis F 2 :
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Interpreting School Social Work Services in the Actual
condition.
As can be seen in Figure 6, there is no interaction
between school social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired and the Ideal and Actual Conditions.

Both

of the hypotheses were rejected and it is concluded that
there are differences between school social workers and
teachers of the emotionally impaired in both the Ideal and
the Actual Conditions.
Hypothesis G 1 i
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Liaison between Family and Community Agencies in the
Ideal condition.
Hypothesis G 2 ;
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Liaison between Family and Community Agencies in the
Actual condition.
As caui be seen from Figure 7, there is aun inter­
action; the first hypothesis could not be rejected and it
was concluded that there were no differences between school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
their perception of the priorities in the Ideal Condition.

95

Condition

Variable
Interpreting
School Social
Work Services
Factor
Means

IDEAL
ACTUAL

Mean Square

Univariate F
4.8129
22.3337

49.6926
331.5047

.0298
.0001

25
20

20.30--19.18“ -

SSW

15
10

16.92
- -14.02

--

IDEAL
Fig. 6. Differences between school
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
their perception of the priorities assigned
ing school social work services in both the
Actual conditions.

ACTUAL
social workers
Michigan in
to interpret­
Ideal and

96

Variable

Condition.

Liaison between
Family and
Community
Agencies
Factor
Means

IDEAL
ACTUAL

Mean Square

Univariate F

p <

.0104
9.9188

.9191.
.0020

.0632
104.0192

20
18.45„
18.41—
15

SSW
16.11
14.48

10

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 7. Differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to laison
between family and community agencies in both the Ideal
and Actual conditions.

97
The teachers and the school social workers assigned similar
importance to Liaison between Family and Community Agencies.
Hypothesis G2 was rejected and it was concluded that in
the Actual Condition the teachers of the emotionally
impaired assigned significantly higher rating to Liaison
between Family and Community Agencies than did the school
social worker.
Hypothesis H I ;
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Interpreting the Child to the Teacher in the Ideal
condition.
Hypothesis H 2 :
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Interpreting the Child to the Teacher in the Actual
condition.
As can be seen from Figure 8, there is no inter­
action; both hypotheses were rejected and it was concluded
that there are significant differences between school
social worker and teachers of the emotionally impaired in
their perception of the priorities assigned to Interpreting
the Child to the Teacher in both the Ideal and the Actual
Conditions.

School social workers saw this as being sig­

nificantly higher in their Ideal program, while at the

98

Variable

Condition

Mean Square

Univariate F

IDEAL
ACTUAL

44.8609
104.4277

12.8922
17.8964

Interpreting
the Child to
the Teacher
15 --

12.06--10.99-10

.0005*
.0001

SSW
—

10.11

8.48

--

IDEAL

ACTUAL

Fig. 8. Differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to interpret­
ing the child to the teacher in both the Ideal and Actual
conditions.

99
same time they saw this as receiving significantly higher
priority in the Actual Condition than did the teachers.
Hypothesis II;
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Clinical Treatment for Children in the Ideal condition.
Hypothesis 12;
There will be no significant difference between School
Social Workers and Teachers of the Emotionally Impaired
in their perception of the priorities assigned to
Clinical Treatment for Children in the Actual condition.
As can be seen in Figure 9, there is no interaction
between group membership and the condition, Ideal-Actual
(Measure).

The first hypothesis of no differences was

not rejected and we concluded that there are no differences
between school social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired in their perception of the Ideal program
with respect to Clinical Treatment for Children.

There

was, however, a significant difference between school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired
in their perception of the priorities that are being
assigned to the factor of Clinical Treatment for Children
in the Actual Condition.

We can reject the null Hypothe­

sis 12 and conclude that there are differences in the per­
ception of the priorities assigned to Clinical Treatment
for Children in the Actual Condition.

100

Variable

Condition

Clinical
Treatment
for Children
Factor
Means

IDEAL
ACTUAL
15 --

Mean Square

Univariate F

1.1347
215.8751

.2181
28.1958

.6412
.0001

SSW
14.24
14.07------ T?LI_

12.71
10.36

IDEAL

ACTUAL

10

Fig. 9. Differences between school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally impaired in Michigan in
their perception of the priorities assigned to clinical
treatment for children in both the Ideal and the Actual
conditions.

101
Rank Order of Factor Means
The relative priority assigned to the factors by
the teachers of the emotionally impaired and by the school
social workers has not yet been dealt with.

Did the

teachers, for example, assign a higher priority to the
Leadership factor than to the Liaison factor?
The percentage scores for the factors described
in Chapter III were developed to make possible such com­
parisons.

In Tables 20 and 21 the factors are ranked in

order of the priorities assigned to them, and the per­
centage scores for each factor are provided.
Ideal
1.

In the Ideal Condition the teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired rated Liaison between Family and
Community Agencies as receiving the highest
priority.

They rated Casework Services to Parents

and Child as next in order of priority.

Teachers

rated Leadership and Policy Making as the least
important function of the school social worker in
the Ideal Condition.
2.

In the Ideal Condition school social workers rated
Casework Services to Parents and Child as the most
important function of the school social worker.
They rated Interpreting the Child to the Teacher

TABLE 20
RANK ORDER OF FACTOR MEANS IN THE IDEAL CONDITION
Rank

Teachers of the
Emotionally Impaired

Percentage
Score

School Social Worker

Percentage
Score

1

Liaison

85.43

Casework (full)

90.58

2

Casework

84.63

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

88.81

3

Clinical Treatment

83.08

Liaison

85.20

4

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

79.15

Clinical Treatment

84.32

5

Caseload Management

79.13

Interpreting SSW

84.10

6

Interpreting SSW

78.36

Caseload Management

82.36

7

Education

74.55

Education

72.27

8

Personal Service
to the Teacher

58.69

Leadership

68.40

Leadership

54.97

Personal Service
to the Teacher

64.81

TABLE 21
RANK ORDER OF FACTOR MEANS IN THE ACTUAL CONDITION
Rank

Teachers of the
Emotionally Impaired

Percentage
Score

School Social Worker

Percentage
Score

1

Liaison

62.74

Casework

76.17

2

Casework

60.05

Clinical Treatment

73.11

3

Caseload Management

60.00

Caseload Management

72.33

4

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

56.50

Liaison

72.06

Clinical Treatment

55.90

Interpreting the Child
to the Teacher

71.21

6

Education

53.32

Interpreting SSW

66.77

7

Interpreting SSW

51.90

Education

62.45

8

Leadership

30.69

Personal Service to
the Teacher

43.26

Personal Service to
the Teacher

28.96

Leadership

33.35

104
as the next most Important function of the school
social worker.

The least Important function of

the school social worker was Personal Service to
the Teacher.
Actual
1.

Liaison between Family and Community Agencies was
rated as receiving the highest priority In the
Actual Condition by teachers of the emotionally
Impaired.

Personal Service to the Teacher was

seen as receiving the lowest priority.
2.

Casework Services to Parents and Child was seen as
receiving the highest priority in the Actual Con­
dition by school social workers, while Leadership
and

Policy Haking was seen as receiving the lowest

priority.

CHAPTER V
SUMMARY

This study dealt with the tasks of the school social
worker in Michigan.

It was inspired in part by an earlier

study by Costin in which the tasks of the school social
worker in the United States were submitted to factor
analysis in a search for underlying variables.

The current

study asked school social workers and teachers of emotion­
ally impaired children to place themselves in the position
of creating the ideal school social work program by assign­
ing priorities on a six-point scale to a series of tasks.
This gave the respondent the opportunity to describe the
way he felt things ought to be.

At the same time he was

asked to assign a priority to those same tasks in the way
he saw them being performed in his actual setting.

This

allowed the researcher to make some assumptions regarding
the discrepancy, if any, between the actual and ideal
functions of the school social worker in the realm of the
public school in Michigan.

It also permitted him to deter­

mine if there were any discrepancies between the respondents
in their perception of the priorities being assigned in the
ideal and actual conditions.
105

106
To obtain the necessary data, a questionnaire was
designed to elicit responses from school social workers
and teachers of emotionally impaired in Michigan, concern­
ing the priorities assigned to eighty-one task descriptors,
divided into nine factors, in each of the conditions (IdealActual) .
In addition, the questionnaire contained an exten­
sive demographic section designed to enable the researcher
to describe the nature of the sample.
School social workers returned eighty-nine question­
naires (a 71.2 percent return) while teachers of the
emotionally impaired returned seventy questionnaires
(a 56 percent return).

Multivariate analysis of variance

was used to determine if there were differences between
school social workers and teachers of emotionally impaired
in their perception of the importance of nine school social
worker activities; if there were differences between nine
Ideal and nine Actual school social worker activities; and,
if there were differential effects between school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired and the
Ideal and the Actual Conditions.

Univariate analysis of

variance was used as a post hoc procedure to determine
where the differences lay.
The statistical tests of the three hypotheses used
in this study were significant at the .0001 level.
fore, it was possible to conclude that school social

There­

107
workers differ from teachers of the emotionally impaired,
that the Ideal Condition differs from the Actual, and that
there is an interaction between Group and Condition.

Post

hoc analyses were carried out to determine where the sig­
nificant differences occurred.
Following are the findings of the post hoc analyses.
There was a statistically significant difference between
school social workers and teachers of the emotionally
impaired in their perceptions of the priorities assigned
to four of the nine factors in the Ideal Condition.

The

school social worker as compared to the teacher of the
emotionally impaired rated the following factors as more
important:

(1) Leadership and Policy Making, (2) Casework

Services to Parents and Child, (3) Interpreting School
Social Work Services, and (4) Interpreting the Child to
the Teacher.
There was a statistically significant difference
between school social workers and teachers of the emotion­
ally impaired in their perceptions of the priorities being
assigned to eight of the nine factors in the Actual Con­
dition.

Leadership and Policy Making was the only factor

that both the teacher and the school social workers saw
as receiving the same importance in the Actual Condition.
It is important to note that all eight of the remaining
factors in the Actual Condition were rated as receiving less
importance by teachers.

On the other hand, school social

108
workers perceived those eight factors as receiving sig­
nificantly more importance in the Actual Condition.

A

further analysis involved comparisons of the factor means
after these had been transformed into percentages to make
them comparable.

In the Ideal Condition the teachers of

the emotionally impaired rated Liaison Between Family and
Community Agencies as receiving the highest priority.

They

rated Casework Services to Parents and Child as next in
order of priority.
In the Ideal Condition school social workers rated
Casework Services to Parents and Child as the most impor­
tant function of the school social worker.

They rated

Interpreting the Child to the Teacher as the next most
import lint function of the school social worker.

The least

important function of the school social worker was Personal
Service to the Teacher.
Liaison Between Family and Community Agencies was
rated as receiving the highest priority in the Actual Con­
dition by teachers of the emotionally impaired.

Personal

Service to the Teacher was seen as receiving the lowest
priority.

Casework Services to Parents and Child was seen

as receiving the highest priority in the Actual Condition
by school social workers, while Leadership and Policy Making
was seen as receiving the lowest priority.

109
Limitations of the Study
Before any attempt is made to draw any conclusions
from this study, it is important to identify as clearly as
possible the limitations of the study.

First, changes in

education are a slow and ever-evolving process.

What is

relevant at one point in history may not be relevant at
another point.

The role of the school social worker as

defined in this study is based on a conceptualisation of
the role of the late 1960s.

During that time there was a

call for a change in the direction that school social work
was going.

The call was for more concentration on the

school as an institution and the child as a member of that
institution.

This suggested that the school social worker

operate with individual children less and concentrate on
changing the environment of the school to accommodate the
school to the child.

This necessitated that the school

social worker take a stronger lead in the development of
policy and in the process of decision making.

As was noted

earlier, Costin (1968) discovered that this was not an on­
going situation and in fact that school social workers
were reflecting the writings of the 40s and 50s.

That is,

they were emphasising in their day-to-day activities a
casework and individual therapy approach with children.
The individual items which were used in this study
were derived from the original Costin work and were biased

1X0
in the direction of the school social workers taking a
strong leadership and policy-making approach to the job.
With the enactment of P.A. 198, more children were
being screened into classrooms for the emotionally impaired.
This placed an added responsibility on the teachers and
social workers to work together to best meet the needs of
the children.

It is possible that the role description as

described by Costin, and subsequently used by this
researcher, is not relevant to the times.

In fact, it

may be that any future research of a similar nature may
have to generate a whole set of task descriptors that are
specifically related to Michigan and P.A. 198.
Second, the present study did not make any attempt
to distinguish between the classroom teacher and the non­
classroom teacher.

The job description of the classroom

teacher is relatively clear cut.

However, the role parame­

ters of the teacher consultant are frequently not clearly
defined and are often left to the discretion of the indi­
vidual consultant.

This lack of clear-cut differentiation

surrounding the job of the teacher consultant often allows
or makes it necessary for the consultant to enter into
areas of responsibility that may overlap with the job of
the school social worker.

This overlap may cause conflict

or confusion between the school social worker and the
teacher consultant.

This lack of differentiation between

the nonclassroom teacher and the classroom teacher for

Ill
the emotionally impaired may have interfered with the
results of the present study.
Third, the present study failed to control for the
amount of time that a school social worker was involved
with classroom programs for the emotionally impaired.

It

is possible that some of the respondents may never be
involved with teachers of the emotionally impaired.

Although

this may never have no relevance to the generalized descrip­
tion of the tasks of the school social worker from the per­
ception of the school social worker, it may confuse and con­
found the results when this perception is used in comparison
with the perceptions of the teacher of the emotionally
impaired.
Finally, two additional variables were not con­
trolled in the present study— educational background of the
school social worker and length of time in the profession
of both the school social worker and the teacher of the
emotionally impaired.
In retrospect, it seems that the educational back­
ground of the school social worker may have influenced the
responses to the questionnaire.

Had the school social

worker had a teacher's certificate and classroom teaching
experience, the responses may have been different from the
individual who had neither.
It is interesting to note that there is a wide
range of differences in the length of time in the profession

112
of the school social workers.

This would Imply that these

individuals had been students at various times throughout
the changing philosophies concerning school social worker
roles.

Had this information been controlled, the results

may have been different.
Discussion
It is important for the reader to take care in
attempting to interpret the results of the present study.
For while it is possible that there is meaning in the
various factors, there was never any intention on the part
of the author to define the role of the school social
worker.

The major thrust of the research was to discover

if there was any difference in the perceptions of the
respondents with respect to the role of the school social
worker as measured by the nine factors in both an Ideal
Condition and in an Actual Condition.
One would expect that there might be a difference
between the Ideal and the Actual responses of school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired when asked
to create the ideal school social work program.

There

would be a natural inclination to want to have things
better in an ideal world.

This was demonstrated clearly

in the results of the present study.

The uniqueness of

the results is that there is a clear distinction between
school social workers and teachers of the emotionally

113
impaired in what they envision the ideal school social
work program to be.
Teachers are asking that school social workers
establish and coordinate contacts between family and com­
munity agencies as the single most important part of an
ideal program.

School social workers see themselves as

providing casework services to parents and children as
their single highest rated priority.

This discrepancy

provides us with one of the clues to the confusion and
conflict which exists between the two professions.

If

school social workers are attempting to implement an
approach to social work that emphasizes the casework
approach, this of necessity limits the amount of time
the social worker can spend coordinating external services
to the family.
Both school social workers and teachers of the
emotionally impaired see Leadership and Policy Making and
Educational Counseling as being of little importance in
the ideal program.

This is in direct conflict with the

social work literature of the 60s.

At that time there was

a call for social workers to be taking more of a leadership
role.

The results of this study would seem to indicate

that neither teachers nor social workers feel this is of
prime importance.
Yet, as was pointed out earlier, many of the
school social workers were educated during the time that

114
the emphasis in training was on the leadership role that
the school social worker was to take.

This may cause

confusion and conflict within the ranks of the school
social workers.
The significant differences between school social
workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired in their
perceptions of the priorities assigned in the Ideal Con­
dition to the variables, Leadership and Policy Making,
Casework Services to Parents and Child, Interpreting the
Child to the Teacher, and Interpreting School Social Work
Services, are of particular interest.

If either profession

attempts to implement these functions as they perceive them,
there is the possibility of conflict and confusion.

School

social workers see these functions as significantly more
important than do teachers of the emotionally impaired.
In the Actual Condition school social workers view
their job as having higher priorities in each of the eight
significant factors.

While these are perceived variables,

it does give an indication that what school social workers
see themselves as doing is not what the teachers of the
emotionally impaired see them as doing.

This discrepancy

is of importance to the planners of future programs.

For

while school social workers may think that they are ren­
dering a priority service to teachers, the teachers are
not perceiving this as being a service of the same priority.

115
Recannendations
While this study should not be used as the basis
for defining the role of the school social worker. It
should provide Information to the State Department of Edu­
cation and university training programs for both school
social workers and teachers of the emotionally impaired,
about the discrepancies that currently exist between these
two professions.

It is essential that if the discrepancies

that exist are to be corrected, mutual interaction and com­
munication must be established and maintained.

A leader­

ship role must be assumed by the State Department of Edu­
cation, followed by a commitment from the universities
toward the eventual goal of providing the most beneficial
programming for children.
In order to accomplish this goal, statewide inservice training sessions that include both school social
workers

and

teachers of emotionally impaired must be

established.
University training programs must open lines of
communication between the various departments with the goal
of understanding the needs of the other professions.
School social workers must clarify exactly what
their role encompasses.

They must describe to teachers

of emotionally impaired children what they can and cannot
do, what they will and will not do.

116
Teachers of the emotionally impaired must make
known to school social workers what it is that they need.
Together they must determine if those needs can be met by
the school social worker.

APPENDICES

APPENDIX A
COMPLETE LIST OF TASKS USED
COSTIN IN ORIGINAL STUDY

APPENDIX A
COMPLETE LIST OF TASKS USED BY
COSTIN IN ORIGINAL STUDY

1.

Describes the nature, objectives, and procedures of
school social work service.

2

.

Encourages suggestions and criticisms from the teacher.

3.

Interprets the child's problem.

4.

Discusses whether the problem is suitable for service.

5.

Distinguishes between normal and problem behavior in
a child.

6

.

Assesses the improvement which can be expected in the
child and/or family.

7.

Explains the ways in which a child's emotional or
social problems may affect his academic performance.

8

.

Provides relevant information (e.g., social history,
impression from parents, agencies).

9.

Helps teacher plan how she will interpret to the child
the referral for service and the role of the social
worker.

10.

Discusses the nature of the teacher's interactions
with the child (e.g., how she may be contributing to
the child's problem, or which child behaviors she
doesn't seem to be able to cope with).
117

118
11.

Helps the teacher recognize possible differences in
the values of the child and teacher.

12

.

Evaluates periodically with the teacher the problem
as originally referred, the progress, and the impli­
cations for the teacher's work with the child.

13.

Suggests ways to utilize peer relationships within
the classroom or on the school grounds.

14.

Helps teacher discover the child's resources for
achieving success.

15.

Helps beginning teacher to anticipate the kinds of
problems which she may encounter with parents in her
school.

16.

Offers suggestions concerning how to deal with parents
(e.g., what to discuss, how to encourage acceptance
of service or how to suggest changes in the parents'
methods of handling their child).

17.

Acts as a liaison between teacher and parents (e.g.,
holds joint conferences, clears up misunderstandings,
and interprets parental viewpoints to teacher).

18.

Acquaints teacher with and encourages her to use com­
munity services, especially those available for her
direct use with the child and his family.

19.

Gives teacher encouragement, sympathy, and understand­
ing with respect to difficult classroom situations
(e.g., problem behaviors, a removal of a child from
her class or the day-by-day stresses of teaching).

119
20.

Helps the teacher understand her own personal problems.

21 . Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with

personal problems where the teacher's own difficulties
prevent her from being effective in her work.
2 2 . Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with

her own personal problems, even though they are not
interfering with her work.
23.

Reviews the child's cumulative record and takes notes
on pertinent information.

24.

Observes the child in the classroom, noting inter­
actions with peers and teacher, and how he goes about
studying and learning.

25.

Observes the child at home, noting his physical char­
acteristics, interaction with parents and siblings,
and his general living conditions.

26.

Interviews child to determine his feelings and
reactions concerning his home, his school, and his
problems.

27.

Obtains from various school personnel a description
of the child's problems and his behavior at school,
both in and out of the classroom.

28.

Obtains from parents information on the child's
behavior at home, and his previous development and
experiences.

120
29.

Obtains from parents Information about the family's
functioning (e.g., financial and employment situation;
satisfaction or discord in family relationships).

30.

Assesses the child's functioning in relation to his
neighborhood patterns and other cultural influences.

31.

Assesses the child's functioning in relation to the
general characteristics of the school in which he is
a pupil.

32.

Obtains information about the child's medical problems
from the family physician.

33.

Obtains information from other agencies who have had
experience with the child and/or his family.

34.

Obtains psychiatric, psychological, or social casework
consultations where problems in diagnosis occur.

35.

Formulates a statement which describes the child's
problem and its etiology.

36.

Selects and periodically revises the plan for service
and its goals.

37.

Explains to the child how they will work together
(e.g., time and place of appointments; the worker's
contact with his teacher and parents).

38.

Clarifies the school's social and academic expec­
tations and regulations with the child.

39.

Helps the child gain insight into his emotional
problems•

121
40.

Helps the child change his overt behavior in life
situations.

41.

Helps the child develop new attitudes or modify old
ones.

42.

Helps

the child develop his educational goals or values.

43.

Helps

the child develop his personal goals or values.

44.

Helps the child understand his abilities and interests.

45.

Helps the child to understand his relationship to
important adults in his life.

46.

Helps the child to control or express his feelings
appropriately.

47.

Works with an individual child in a casework relation­
ship.

48.

Works with groups of children using the group process.

49.

Interprets to the child reasons for his behavior and
his relationship to others.

50.

Offers emotional support (e.g., through reassurance,
trust, friendship).

51.

Offers advice, suggestions, and direction.

52.

Offers factual information.

53.

Reflects back to the child his expressed attitudes
and feelings.

54.

Interprets to the child the nature of the school's
authority over him.

55.

Interprets to the child the nature of his parents'
authority over him.

122
56.

Clarifies with the parents the nature of the child's
problems.

57.

Explains to the parents what is involved in social
work service (e.g., relationships between the child
and worker; the worker and teacher; home visits;
casework opportunities for the parents).

58.

Clarifies with the parents the school's social and
academic expectations and regulations.

59.

Helps parents to develop realistic perceptions of
their child's academic potential and performance, his
limitations, and his future.

60.

Helps parents to see how they contribute to their
child's problems (e.g,,-through their own marital
problems, poor home conditions, or by their particu­
lar methods of child care).

61.

Helps parents to see how they contribute to their
child's growth (i.e., recognize their own particular
strengths as parents).

62.

Makes suggestions as to how the parents can improve
their relations with his teacher and with his school.

63.

Interprets to parents who are ignoring school regu­
lations the nature of the school's authority and its
expectations.

123
64.

Supplies parents with information they may need to
improve relationships within the family (e.g,, special
needs of slow, gifted, or handicapped children; sexual
problems; child-rearing practices).

65.

Makes regular visits to parents to maintain a liaison
between home and school in order to reinforce parents'
interest and concern for their child's school life.

66.

Plans or conducts educational meetings with groups of
parents to increase their knowledge about their
children's development, their role as parents, etc.

67.

Works with groups of parents to organize and channel
their concerns about the problems of their school
system (e.g., over-crowded classrooms, the curriculum,
school population).

68 . Describes to other special service personnel the range

of services the social worker is able to provide.
69.

Consults with other special service personnel to
develop and coordinate an overall treatment approach
for the child.

70.

Participates on school committees to improve effec­
tiveness of all the special services.

71.

Describes to principal the range of services the
social worker is able to provide.

72.

Involves the principal in plans concerning a case and
suggests ways he may help deal with the problem.

124
73.

Checks on attendance by making home visits in cases
of prolonged or unexplained absences.

74.

Helps with administrative tasks such as collection of
unpaid book rentals, investigating need for lunchroom
fee waivers or following up on children who have not
obtained required physical examinations.

75.

Channels back to school administrators knowledge about
neighborhoods and other cultural influences in the
lives of the school's pupils.

76.

Encourages administrators to develop cooperative work­
ing relationships with community agencies.

77.

Works with school administrators, individually or in
groups, to examine the symptoms and determine causes
of problems in the school system.

78.

Consults with school administrators in the formulation
of administrative policy which directly affects the
welfare of pupils.

79.

Maintains required records of social work service,
keeps schedule of activities up to date, and writes
reports of services.

80.

Periodically screens the children in the building for
referrals, through informal contacts with teachers,
principal, or other special service personnel.

81.

Clears referrals with teacher and principal when the
referral has originated elsewhere.

125
82.

Channels information such as referrals, suggestions,
and releases to appropriate personnel.

83.

Sets up appointments with child, parents, or other
appropriate persons.

84.

Keeps principal informed of all referrals, number of
cases being carried, and progress of selected cases.

85.

Participates in staffings, even when child is not
known to the social worker, in order to remain
familiar with as many children in the building as
possible.

86 .

Does long-range follow-ups on completed cases by talk­
ing to teacher, friends, parents, or child.

87.

Belongs to and assumes responsibility in professional
social work and educational organizations.

88

.

Works actively to obtain increased salaries and
improved working conditions for teachers and other
school personnel.

89.

Participates in research projects.

90.

Publishes new findings and perspectives on social
work services in the school setting.

91.

Assists in the recruiting of social work personnel.

92.

Assists in the education of social work personnel
(e.g., field instruction of graduate social work
students).

126
93.

Assists In the inservice training of teachers or
administrators (e.g., in areas such as techniques of
behavior control, or interviewing).

94.

Supplies information to parents about welfare agencies
or public health facilities (e.g., location; appli­
cation procedures, etc.).

95.

Refers parents by telephone or written report, to
appropriate community agencies for serious problems
(e.g., need for financial assistance, marital counsel­
ing, treatment for mental illness, illegitimacy).

96.

Acts as a liaison between a family and a social agency
to insure that, following referral, service gets under
way (e.g., by interpreting the life style of a family
to the agency worker and in turn, the agency require­
ments and expectations to the family).

97.

Actively encourages child or family to make maximum
use of community resources to which they have been
referred, and gives continuing positive support to
them in their attempts.

98.

Acts as a liaison between the school and other agen­
cies (e.g., by accompanying or transporting a child
or parent to an agency).

99.

Encourages children and families to ask for and make
maximum use of community "supplementary11 or "enabling1*
services (e.g., day care, homemaker, summer camps,
Y's, parent education groups, various home helps).

127
100.

Helps to bring about new outside-of-school programs
through work with other individuals and community
groups (e.g., recreation, day care, health clinics,
etc.).

101

.

Accepts responsibilities within a community council
or other planning and coordinating group.

102

.

Attends and contributes to meetings of social action
groups, aside from professional social work or edu­
cation organizations (e.g., housing reform groups,
civil rights organizations, or neighborhood improve­
ment associations).

103.

Interprets the nature of school social work services
to other community agencies or interested groups
through speeches, panel discussions, etc.

104.

Represents school in community actions involving
school children such as juvenile court hearings.

105.

Helps am expellee or school dropout to find an
accepted)le and constructive role in the community.

106.

Helps interpret to the community the school admin­
istrative policies which have to do with pupil
welfare.

APPENDIX B
SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER QUESTIONNAIRE

APPENDIX B

EBIs^Si^^B^s^Elatetf^iivsrsl^^i
D ^ w rtn H it o f E lM M lv y v id Special Edw M loii
301 D lilw o n W , E a t I anting, M ioM pn 40034
TASKS OF THE SCHOOL OOCIAL WORKER
PLEASE RESPOND TO A LL ITEM S
M o w you w ill find a list of tasks — nclatart w ith School Social Work. For aach task statement you w ill
find tw o quastkme to anewar:
1.

The first question asks you to think o f youraaH as hawing the reaponeibttlty for cresting an ID EA L
School Social Work program. For each task statement, you are to aasign the priority which you
believe would apply in your ID EA L program.
Cross out the number which you feel best describes the priority you would assist each fade in your
IDEAL program.
1 X 3 4 S 0 (example)
• 1 is the lowest priority a tadt can hove.
# 6 Is the hl^iast priority a tadt can hme.

2.

The second question asks you to assign the priority which you believe throu#) your experience, to
bo capreaantetlwa o f the ACTUAL prioridee being assigned to each o f the tasks by School Social
Workers in your distric t
Cross out the number which you feel best rtascrihss the priority PRESENTLY being assigned to eeoh
o f the tasks by School Sodd Workers in your d istrict
1 2 3 4 6 K (example)
•1 is the lowest priority a task can have,
f o it w t m p N R prion cy • w k coy novo.

TASKS
1. UPHnV IFQR1 POPRI nTfusnWHvn O f t IrW O iO Tf SOOIOs « fwRWi
end his previous development end sxeeriwiBeib

IDEAL
LO
HI
123
4S6

ACTUAL
LO
HI
123
4 SB

2. heqnelnw wschsr w idt end eneoureew her te w e comm unity
■•rvtoe*, e p x ld r dwee eveHebte ta r her dkeet wee w ith the chMd
---- a *-■- ^ _ | L .
■no
vPe
■
e
*
e
—
aL.
1 ^ 1 ^ *
-u m *
*8* m ip i t o onno p p' ■t n
o p fi m—o— fc-t—
no o-----io iN»T -O- ■i m
pvtoprci

123

4 SS

12 3

4 BS

1 23

4 SS

1 23

4 SB

8k UTOV IT O nM TOR ■ ■>■* P O |Wf BIpM IwWn Vw FlfOrSi RO

1 23

4SS

12 3

4 BB

t i N if n
tv io h tr id i o o M iw ilty ip iv y l o h op w ftti tiro o ro
p m o w l pvoWvnw. o d d VyomP pipy m not In o rtv rin p mM i
bar work.

1 23

4 SS

1 23

4 BB

123

4 BS

1 23

4 BB

1 23

4 SS

1 23

4 • 6

1 23

4 SS

1 23

4 SB

1 23

4 BS

1 23

4 ft

ol

r«

u n o n t oft vnfnoonDS oy
or uneepidnsd ebeeneee.

n o w v n v m o o o or

im u iv

^POD ^Rg Pv^P O^RPPEQ^E viPg

^f

^f^^nvy

& Oov8 In fo m ili lo if f in p foMoroupv on D O fnpklid
triU n p Do DMokvCf frk n d ii p o o vkr o r vMM.

to nro m

^ff^A
opdpv

fay

Vt BflPOUrVOTO ^nDOfvR PnO TOnPfPV TO POK ITO |M ^RVDCP OOl^BMO
B ^ ^ ^^MABieu H
^ ^ ^ W
P
B^bflwedl
upp o f oofMHNnfiy
PO OA ^PnovpfT
to H ^PffPPffv^
ip f p o
b u b b

b

u

a u

128

129

ia

M l i lp— i In

iw m

IDEAL
LO
HI
12 3
411

I grpjacts.

vi^n^vni1^nD^n^^winv
-J - ----- -

12.

^^^r

^ J U I L

hdqqoio.

A m M r f k l ^ M l n u ------------

•

n •• ^k^v^k
*

A. m. A

ACTUA
LO
123
4
123

4

P w tlD lp iw In otaMing, w on whan ohMd to n ot known to dw
^Aalal
I
K
^
A
^
I
E ^ III
Jiii
I^E ^
HB(V *W n[w|
HI
Q IW
w
MMMn
V ffllN i w^HWI
9 WJI^r OAnDO
aOV.
In tha building aa poaW a.

123

416

12 3

4

13.

v s n iu n i wvw w n m m v v iB n m i n ivnn vQ in 01 ■wvwir
aMCNi policy wMcN dbvotly o ffo cti the d M w o f pupN i

123

4 S

12 3

4

14.

M c c p i vM i fo
PweMM .

123

4 B

12 3

4

IE

iw p i wA
o 0000 w u r a o m
a d u t* In Ma Wfe.

10 onpononi

123

4 B

12 3

4

IE

A o N o lik Pm oduooPoii o f nodd o o fk pcfcooficl to.p, fld d
IfM m cPon o f pnP iiolc nodd 00 N sfu d w d l.

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

17.

n o o m vno o m i n o w v w o 0 n m o n vo m noonM im uQ
p P M m p d p N o o d p if IoPuooool

123

4 B

12 3

4

IE

M P o o p d o vNHi P p o o d fo m dn tdn 0 HoPon b tp m n
homo w P n d io d In n ^ d ii p k P n li^ p piiono^ In ic io in d
o om on fo r P id r ehP dt ichool Wo.

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

IE

^BONi HI VO tVOVOi^n Of OOP lO O pO!OVM<

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

1 23

4 B

123

4

12 3

m m f

3E
21.

m f

w

j m

o b

a

o m Iip

j b

m

b b

w

b

b

b b

b b

10 conow

b

b

w

f o ficcufo o f N o N io vfo fo m d f i
L
|
no
iw v o n H ip
b

A
b I^b
b
b
A
b
b
A

ZZfZZZfZZZXZZ^SZ.M
n c p i wo c v p

b b b b u

M M n

or c o o o imp iv io n p d W O * w o f.

22.

n o p i w o o w p m w p n owo no o n o io n o p w o n o *

12 3

2E

OoHftnv ortpi Pm porovPi Pm oNooi^i nodd end w d o n lc
wpoototionn end fopPcPom.

12 3

34.

DMopdahos N w o c i nonod in d p ra M m bdm vior P

2E

0 diMd»

4 S

12 3

4

48

12 3

4

4 S

12 3

4

12 3

48

12 3

4

N o o p P i Pm n p u iv o f adiool p P d work sw ioon 00 oPior
ocpkwufPtv a o M d o or P o p o id o^oupn P p u ^ i ipoodioti
pond dOcu—loov. no.

1 23

4B

123

4

3E

Knoouroon d o W M O P fi to develop oooporcpvo w M fckii
rdoPofPhtpn w fpi ooramoPCy opvoclM.

12 3

4 B

12 3

4

27.

U T M i lycw O vnvnvoM n

12 3

4 B

12 3

4

2E

Offara advtca, iiig g M ilrri and d traction to tha child and hla
panne

123

4B

12 3

4

2E

^attWpaaaa on aobool aonm ltiaaa to tonprosra allistto an ap d
aN tha v a tW wnrloat

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

sa

Halpt parann to too how b a r oom ribuw to p ia ir ah tod's
proifaaw (#.f~ E ra a # i thalr own m arital paaMonw. poor
honw condition*, o r bp M r particular moahodi o f ahtod earn).

123

4 B

12 3

4

31.

Obtalna hom vartoua w hooi panonnal a daaarlpalon o f dw
a
*Avon
f
c
a
—
e
^ _,|-, 0
_
L ^E w
1
*
- .^ 4 _
_
B
A
M
d
fionnpv
proovora
one
oononor
1vwmwo oow
o ra out
o f dw alawroon.

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

Hofon dw taaahar to a oonm unitY oganop fo r halp w hh pavaonal
probEaw adw n dw taoahav^a o w i dtfftouftlaa piw w nt hw Ira a
baing offaotiva In hw w otfi.

1 23

4 B

12 3

4

id wo

envoi ono no povnL

b

32.

130

IDEAL

LO
33l

CtartftM w ith th» p r w f dw m im o f tfw o H h fi problem.

34*

IM p i p ifiM i to m how they o o iM ih iiti to their chHd*i
p w r tli II a , rocopibe M r own portleulor tiro n g ih t at

ACTUAL
LO
1 23
1 23

123
M

O ffert aua^ctfom ootwervdno how to d o l w tlh parents.

1 23

37.

iM p i to bring about now o u tttd M fo h o il p ro fa n e th ro u ^t
work w fdt odw r b d M b iili w tf comm unity p o u p t

12 3

33.

duppltaa Inform ation to pw o nti p it tN d w i about welfare
o p m le * or publk
procedural; <0.1

6 23

1 23
referral fo r tarvloo and tha ro k o f dw toaial a o rta f.

40,

H dpt dw ehdd develop hb aduoodondl poala o r rd u a t

123

41.

A tta n a t d w Impraoamant tM d i can ba o p i t l i f In dw oMtd
and/or flandty.

12 3

43.

In
dw iw tura o f dw <811001*9 authority and H i xpaotatlom *

t 23

43.

ActHaty arwourapat ohdd or famlhr to nwtw matdaaum uta ^ f
to^R^HHnla^ raaauraai to <41^8 i4 r< H aa tta n mfarro^L tn d
■Hat oondnukip potHbw m pport to dw nt In dw b a tp p p b

12 3

44.

Attands and oontrlbut w to meadow d aoeM ac tion areupA

123

during td to o l h ou r*
46.

06.

t b it o w hh w hool adwd w ku ito rA IndM duady or In poupA
to anambw dw tympta^aa and datamRhw oautaa o f prohtam t In

123

IIO

12 3

■ la how dm B H M it a n Im ura n

m

^ ^ l a a a
rim
n a m n n m a n w m n Lm. n u n .
i

47.

Dbauwat uhedwr dw probltm k auHdbAa fo r tarvloo.

123

46.

H alpi dw taochar undaratand har own partonal

12 3

46.

Conaulta wHh odw r meoM aarvloa pam rm al to

12 3

SOL

A m p k n ^ m M W ii « M t • oommuntty aounoi
iid tu o id n w ln i in u p l

12 3

SI •

W tH ti

62.

M W h n id i froMp* d
a e n o m d a w praMi

I 23

S3.

Ada aa a tlalaon batwaan a tamSy and a aooM afaney to

I 2 3

rnW

Ula^.
uJA
_4
■-iL^ ---w orm wrwi p o w r or anooron aomp t o p w p proaam

1 23

oOb

io B m Iv

tv flb dlR I w i i i i d

mM m

in d iM pfflw id

m

A I ib

Explain* to tha ddW ta w dw y wW w artt W fid ta r k a , tln w and
ptaaa o f o p d n tm n t; dw worfcar'i oonaai

12 3

123

131

6C

M lh k B
H W iM

IOCAL
HI
LO
123
4 B6

new Sndtngi a n d

ACTUAL
LO
HI
123
4 BS

In t f d W h O O l t e t t ln p

17.

DwoHbai to principal tha range o f xervloax tha aoalal
w oriw r Ii ib t i to p fo rid it

12 3

4 SB

123

466

Mi>

C U rtflii ih i tth o o l*t toeM otd M d o n iB o tp io M lo n i m d

123

4 BS

123

456

12 3

4 BS

123

4 B6

12 3

4 ss

12 3

45 6

12 3

4 BS

123

456

12 3

4 BS

12 3

4 5 8

12 3

4 B8

12 3

4 BS

Inform ation ftw n o d o r ip n o iii who Im v i Nod
wHh tha oMM and/or Mo fam ily.
Ml
61.

R v w n m w h u m v«v snw« i fvm sow p m n iv ii

hyiMift

n uvii

raqvfeod
o f aooM w oih tanftoa, fcoopa id o d u li
o f tc th rltia t yp to data# and wrltaa
itta raportt
i t o f tarvioate
sarvioaa.

•2.

of
w d it a parBtpt lnno o f M r ohid*t
parfornwnoa, h it llm ltationt* and h it

14,

HaAoa dia taaahar
roaoonteo ^ooadbit
dffVariMaa
in dw
a ^ n n x w
n x w w ^ »
x x ^ x w ^ i ^ o xxx
w x o vahtat o
w xf

123

4 SS

123

4 B6

ool

m ttrpraw to v a anoa i

12 3

4 ss

12 3

4 BS

12 3

4

ss

12 3

456

123

4 BS

12 3

466

D a w h a t to P a
of

123

4 BS

123

4 56

o tN ta ana panoawaay vavaat aw pian var aaraiaa ana no poon*

123

4 56

12 3

4 56

7a

123

4 SS

123

4 56

71.

12 3

4 56

12 3

4 66

Mm. 1 2 3

4 56

123

456

12 3

4 56

123

466

1 23

4 56

123

466

4 56

1 23

4B6

72.

Iiintcrpretr to tha child tha natyro o f tha cehoof*e authority

o po

731
74.

4 56

123

466

77.

i 23 ' 4 56

123

466

7a

rtw p t ta t o n to u n ta ^ o a vat to a v o tt t w tw a a ^
foapm
..
nt t o tto _y__
t m aoawv oa ^OlA^fa
t a t i traotionw or toovtv p t t m t
la academia perfetmenee.

i 23

4 BS

123

456

7a

In ta rp rtu to tha a hM Ota nature o f M parantt' authority awar Mm. 1 2 3

'4 I •

1 23

4 B6

1

t

i 23

1

Interview ehSd to determlna hb fcellngr and raacHonc nonetmlnp
n o n o w , ra t tanoovp ^r^o rat

i

7a

I

i 23

7a

B

8

to rn va tta a a a tn a a w p aaaa* w i^ r o a a a n a w i^ ^ o * w a i

132

nw ^i w

•1

pw b

vnvnp nn v m

m hvnh

hi

IDEAL
HI
LO
123
4 *3

| U *

in v bmJ a iwa Ao^ ^n^ ai ,

y i - ^ .

---« _ _ji i-» .
*- ^ ^ l a a A k
vr*m wvi m
MnvioMii h» w u —m t Gpnivni
rawnonuMpa

ACTUAL
LO
HI
123
411

123

4 33

23

438

123

438

23

4 88

H I A N COMPLETE THE POLLOMMQ INFONMATtON QUESTIONS BY P ILLM Q IN ON CM8CKINO A LL THE
AN8WENS THAT A H IV TO Y O U
H . ______ Hour tana Hm m vnu haan a MfcoNi u ota l aavhaf?
6 i» _ H o w long h m you torni i p ^ w * tooisl w n ritir in ttvte d b trtc tf
M lPIn

n

jn d fn ti your p o fio lflfM l m p lo y iM n t M noty t y oHsoklng iN p p ra p tM i G M poriu*
C liiin B i Hochlng « 4M rtm oi
PofWKrt o o u fm lln t o p irtin M
O tte r tchoai rataMd eNpertonoo

—

C llnh d m M work MpM’lm *
Owwctio fo l o ip t r im
R c o u ilo iiil M p rio M i

_ _ 0 3 w r aocM work n k k d eapc rie n n
18.

PI—

IwHIHa y«Uf

37.

M w i 4M you r w ik i your w id w y d B P i dapnaa?

83.

O n N iM EduoMlon m o a n d o d i aN that apply I
_ lt a n

m^Wf---...

o f Social Work

M n > o f A rti In EdMOOtlan
O m yoor in M w d o f Education
Ono yoor in Soho* o f Soolal Etork
Other (Plana PnaMful
8Bl

Whan <M you or where are you plannkn to receive your aroduan rtayn T

30.

In what ip n p f did you hoaa your Hold w orti traininp2 (Chook n ^aeny anamra n opphf.l
Child Guidance O inte
m.m

-*

II

a^ -*

__m anui nouw

, F atH y Service Apanoy
Pufaiic Sohool
flM w n la w l Sotdnf
Crannam iry Cantor
YMCA-YWCA
_ _ C h 8 d ENHoro Asonoy
Other (P1aan Specify)
81.

M— UiWf o n m

—

it in w u t a«M n if c in M — l

133

a M M ta H p w l

tmtm i

88

M m la d *

n

*

E N pfatl..

_____________

83.

H— many lm lM ln fi* » y flu — v on « i f i t o

98

How many houre por waak do you raaarea fo r reoord htaplnp ptannlnp, and preparation.

88

W w ^ a r a ip p o f Haw a n you Inaolaad w tlh pra p aaa fo r tha amottonally
or Indlreetfyf

h—l r f ----------

Im p a ir e d ,

ahhar dPacdy

0 — 26%
M - SO *
S I - 7® *
78 - 1 0 0 *
88.

Do you foot d tat tMa la an app rgpr laaa paraantapa o f ttaaa to daaota to proprama fo r tha amothmady
■ n p v n iu r

YEt
NO
07.

Waidd you Idio to ipand more o r laaa tflwia worftinp w td i paoNftwa fo r dta amotionaMy Impaired?
MORE
LESS

TMM C O M P U T M THS O USSTIONNAIRL P L0A M POOL P R U TO OOMMOffT ON ANY OP TH«
RESPOMM 9 YOU H A V I MADC TO TMM O U M TIO NNANM ON T H i ROVORM OP T M 8 P A M .
PLSAM PLACE TMM M THO RETURN OMVOLOPC AND M A IL NMMEMATSLY.
THANK YOU POR YOUR COOPORATMML

APPENDIX C
TEACHER OF THE EMOTIONALLY
IMPAIRED QUESTIONNAIRE

APPENDIX C
IMtaht^pn

Unlig^lly

301 Erickson H all, t e l Lam ina. MiaMaan 40034
TASKS OF THE SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKER
PLEASE RESPOND TO A LL ITEM S
Below you w ill find a lift of taakf aw oelated w ith School Sodal Work. For aaoh task ftatam ant you w ilt
find two questions to anawar:
1.

Tha first question asks you to think o f yoursalf aa having tha reaponsMllty for creating an IO EA L
School Social Work program . For aaoh taak ftatam ant, you arc to awign tha priority which you
M iava would apply in your ID EA L program.
Croat out tha numbar which you fsai bast describes tha priority you would awign each taak In your
ID EA L program.
I Z 3 4 B S (example)
#1 la tha lowaat priority a tadc can have.
♦ 6 is tha h(0test priority a tx k can have.

2.

Tha aacond question aaka you to awign the priority vriiich you beiieva thraupi your axparlanca, to
be rapraaantathra o f the ACTUAL priorities being awignad to each o f tha tasks by School Social
Workers in your district.
Cross out die numbar which you fast beat riaacribw tha priority PRESENTLY being aaaipwd to aaoh
o f tha tasks by School Social W orker* In your district.
1 2 3 4 5 K (axampia)
•1 is die lowest priority a task can hove.
* 6 is die M 0w *t priority a taak can have.

spBeOnr* nQ^B Rw^BNb

wW wWRa OWi^OI^B NOR^BRO|

LO

IDEAL

HI

ACTUAL
LO
HI
12 3
411

0■v

O

12 3

4

123

411

/

o

o

123

4»«

A. Clean istorrala w ith waahar and prlnclpai whan tha rafarral hat

13 3

4

123

4 tt

A Motors tha taaohar to a community agmey tor haip w ith har own

123

4

123

4 14

4

123

444

4

123

444

4

123

444

4 • 4

123

444

m d M i pw rtom d M ta p m n i in d n tp tritn o n
Z Aqqw in ti f i r tiir w tth and iWBBiir fM h r to u w oom munity
wnrloas, awar iaHy Sw w svaMabi* la r har « ra e t uw w ith tha eMW
and M r to ady.
roaopo mo w w p m m p i map vnn n *w in r n i

pw pra

i

A Chookt on otiandonas by w dilna homa vW tr In oawr o f p o l onp S

12 3
123

A Dow informal, lo n f range taMowupa on pompl omd caw* by
td
S P ^y
n vn
r ^gp m
s v tMohor
o ^ o w w r f MondL
n ^ w w w y W
^ w wM
n aH
j 1
a

12

A f miniii agar ahbdren and tamilloa to adt tor and make maaVnum
uw of oommunity ,#susptomonwry"" or ""enabling** wnriao*

12 3

134

3

135

ID EAL
LO
HI
1 23
4 5 6

ACTU
LO

ia

h nklpilii In rw orah pn|iA.

11.

Help* toother tfh o tn r tha child** raoouraw ta r ochloelnp wecae*.

12.

f f d r i p l - In «**ffln|L even «dtcn chdd I* not known to th o
eoolol worker, in order %o raraoin tam dlcr w td i c* nwrty ohddran
In the buHdtap H powJM*.

123

466

123
12 3
12 3

IX

Qonwrtt* w ith w hool odm iniotrw an In dw ta n w U u ii o f odminip v w w piW y aM vn a n s p y m n m iM n w i or pupm.

123

4 5 6

1 23

14.

DW m m wHh dw weaker dw nature o f her Inwrocdon* w ith
d w tftfd .

123

4 6 6

1 23

IX

lld p * d w d d d <o undaretand h h nW donddp *o Im portant
loin
U|o
■b w s loo
pi n
p mv»

1 23

4 66

123

IX

Amiw* in dw oduoodan o f n o M work poroonnol f*.X . fW d
fc w im lo fi o f f F iiw ii tooW woffc o u fm ii).

1 2 3

45 6

12 3

I)
l/»

Xt^lonlno la o
^
^
b
H
ota k
ta M
l^
O
A
a
X
ju
u
f
A
B
H
H
dP
wW
N
WP
P
IM
P
P
I^ P
I
IPf
w
BI
W
^
P
P
V
n
Q
O
D

I
I

II.

IM o m ju lv *M ti to p w n ti to omlwmlw o Uofcon h tfw n
h tto m l h NooI lo op9bt to ftin iM H p o m o 1 In to w ctd

133 4 5 6

4

6 *
PPP

12 3

1 23

4 33

12 3

12 3
123

A«
oj

^
^
^
B
O
nOl ^
N
O
I IPIOl l^
R
^
P
iP
O
*

IX

A w ta* In dw roorwHInd o f woW w ork poroonnol.

1 23

4 66

3X

IM p * kw w prat to dw com m unity dw w hool odmlnlewetlee

1 23

456

p
P
H
W
Pw
P
O
PH
P
RIPP
PW
P
1 P
H
^
H^
M
n
V
x

21.

a

HWp* d w Ohdd to control or ooprow M * ( p lta p *pproprt***ty.
| ^ ^ ^

^

o-t-

n vo v ffw p w p pppi p v p ii wpp rap m p v ip iip p p p ra ip *

1 23
t

•

■ « *p

4 66
•

p

j

a

p•

w

12 3
12 3
12 3

2X Ctartfta* w ith dw poronw d w w hool'* n e W end ooodomio

1 23

4 56

34.

DWdnpuhho* botwoon normal ond proMo w behavior in o chdd.

1 23

456

2X

hwwprot* dw nohrro o f whoW aooioi work oonrlooo to edw r
oom munity oponolw or Intorottod p o u fi d iro u p i ipooohoo
ptnol OltoiMPkmtc ots.

1 23

466

12 3
12 3

2X

Enoourapn odm lnhuotnn to develop cooperative w oifclm
rotatlandiipa w tdi oom munity opencioe.

1 2 3

4 56

123

27.

O ften tactual Information to tha chMd ond Ma parent

1 2 3

4 56

2X

Oftare advice, tupp w lo nh and direction to dw child ond M*
pom i

1 23

4 66

12 3
12 3

291 R v tM p itN o ft m fiool ooovfiilttooi to iotpfooo oflpotfopvtom o f
p i tho
mnWm.

1 3 3

4 9 9

12 3

3X

1 23

4 6 6

12 3

123

466

12 3

H dp* parent* to wa how dw y eontribuw to d w ir ohdd**
proMonw fo.^1^ tfr ta ^ k t^bolr w ^ i ntcritol itro^lfoot^^ f* o r
homo condition*, or by dw ir p a rtk ifw madwd* o f chPd oareL

31. Obtoln* from vartau* whool poroonnol o dw w tptlon o f d w
ohdd** problem* end W* hahpelpr at adraol, both In ond out
o f dw otawroom.
32.

Hotaro dw tooohar to o oommunity apwwy ta r help w hh pononol
PVtBMM VPW9 PH IM P B rf OtPR OimOlflllOi p v fra ll M r rfOP
bolnp effective in her work.

123 466

136

IDEAL
LO
HI
13 3 4 6

ACTUAL
LO
HI
123
4 66

33.

CtarMat w ith tha parcrra A t n d u n o f th i tM M 'i pro tl m .

34.

Halpa paranta to w t how to y contribute to thad ohMd't
p w wh (Lai, raoogniaa M r own particular a u a p i h i at
a).

12 3

4 6

123

466

36.

Irwohrat tha prtolpal in plant

12 3

4 6

12 3

4 66

3IL Offtca t i a ar tw a oorworwlng how to dap wrth partem.

1 23

45

12 3

4 66

37. Halpa to brina about now o u ttld t of-achool p ro y am t dtrouflh
wovti arith o d w indteiduala and comm unity youpa.

12 3

4 6

12 3

466

36. Suppliaa Informat ion to Parana and t aaahart about waHara
b m m L i m oufaMe Km M I m |M m (t.A
M BH tttlO ft

12 3

4

123

466

123

4

12 3

4 66

con o w

ning a eaaa and tu w M t

K-).
Halpa t aaahw plan how dw wW man p a t to dw d rld tha
Myv
iap
m
i ia
aw
rl a
mP
rv
l iH
di
t
iiV
t
tlvM
w
n

I§
m
to
te
fi i■
h(«
t a
mw
im
d m
fa
hn
iy
r•
w
mi
v
a
oo
w
v
w

Na edueedonal ym la or valvee.

w4
1

A

W

l u n u a ^ H M r f laa d A ^ m a
DV
(111 wV

M

M

123

4

12 3

4 66

9w
9
14 A

A
N

12 3

4 56

12 3

4

123

466

123

4

123

466

12 3

4

123

466

12 3

4

123

466

12 3

4 66

*
v w■ *o— r vtvvNvy.

42. Intarprata to parama who am ty w rb if aahool w ydw iona tha
dn imcmpv o f t f if
Authority in d Hi OKpootiriovis.
>ohMd or fandly to maha manbnum uaa o f
■

id

u n io n v D f n p i o n n t v r v T i ^ m o

gfcraa continulnp poalthra aupport to b a n In d w ir ottampte.
A taandt and oomributaa to maadngt o f aoelal action y o u p t,
during w hool houra.
46.

Mtorbs w id i aahool admirUatra lora. indMduady or in groups
to anamlna dia prmpaoivw and datavmina oauaaa o f problama in

44.

Mabaa tugptadont at to how dw pwanu can bnpmoa d o t
raw ionv n ip nos M m mm n i p m m o n .

123

4

47.

Dhauaaw whadwr dw prabfam it auitabla fw aanrioa.

12 3

4

123

466

12 3

4

123

466

12 3

4

123

466

12 3

4

12 3

4 66

1m 3

4

123

466

46

Oanaulta td th adw r apaalal aanrioa paraonnaf to davaiop and
o o o r a m n i in o m p v n n m m v t i m m m i i n p i v i w i .

M l AooopU fwpnnafcMWM « M i • o o -w in H y oounpi or o tfu r

pliMlnividooordtaoihioihhp^

il i

W Q lV f M N V f

1®

O0 M

I ra n M B

H M iN R M

M P M M

M IM ^

KZ.

d o d i wHh y o u p t o f pwanu to arpanlaa and channal d w ir
oonaama about paoblama o f dw b aahool tyttam .

123

4

123

466

63.

Aon aa a lltito n batwaan a famHy and a tco id apaney to
inaum dw L follow ing rofawoL aanrioa gata undamroy.

12 3

4

123

466

4

123

466

4

123

466

y o u p t o f ahbdran uaing dw g ro iy prooaaa.
CnpMna to tha chdd how dw y wM worfc togadwr (a.g., tbna and
af
at.

123
12 3

137

ML
57.

IDEAL
LO
HI
12 3
4 85

PuWtahn n iw fin d in p m d p in p c c tM i oo w c iil work
■ m o v hi w o mnoot o n n ^

ACTUAL
LO
123
4

D aoH bn to principal tha ranpa o f aarvtoaa tha aortal
mofknr art
It difln
m
o a a a o to
w
|*t vw
o t rld
t Pi*

12 3

4 86

1 23

4

ML

O orfHoi dw w fto o f't tooW ond H M km k o tp to M fo m and
n p d n lO T w fth dw d d d .

12 3

488

1 23

4

Ml

Ohtrtwa inform ation from a h a aprttrtoa ««ho ham had
topartanct w ith f a chdd and/or Me fam ily.

1 23

4 86

12 3

4

Mb

Ohtalna Inform ation about tha rtilW t m art aal problaaM from

123

4 65

12 3

4

•1 .

Maintaina repair ad rooorda o f aortal work aanrioa. haapa echadule
o f aotloKiaa tip to data, and aaritaa roporta o f aanriaaa.

123

4 86

123

4

52.

Oaaaribaa to oahar apartal tondoa paraonnrt tha ranpa o f aamteaa
dta aooirt worfcor b abfa to prortda.

12 3

4 86

123

4

ML

tprtoa
O
W W PHVW IQ W W W W N m m PHVWKWrt OT
W lr O IR vI

12 3

4 86

1 23

4

**■> i w i

a k

■bwwwwq w
future.

w

k

i

hw

porTQvwwntof nw i w o n n t ora nw

M.

Halpa dw taartwr racapniaa poaaMda diffaionaaa In tha vrtuaa o f
tha ohM and taaohar.

12 3

4 66

1 23

4

M.

Interpret* to dw ohM raaaona fo r h it hahaelor and Me rotation,
d ir t to othorv.

1 23

486

1 23

4

Mb

ffaalaaaa dw r tiM 'f aum ufatht raeord and takoa notaa on pardnont Inform ation.

12 3

4 86

123

4

67.

aBlmlmw
M t o Ml MMWrvlWM aVrO
TUMW** w W fW W VWMIwWVlWVi

123

466

1 23

4

ML

O m rib n to dw in d w f dw iwtntOa o fa jic tk iit ond proooduw
o
ow ^U
a^tf to
p p ra
^ ^d
ww t
^o
^ a a wBik
w M
^^^^oM
■ w to
r o #.

1 23

466

123

4

Ml

Solaata and pari odloally roriaaa tha plan fo r aanrioa and Ita foah.

12 3

466

123

4

70l

Obtafna pnrohiolric. ptyaholoplnrti or aortal oaamaorit oonauftadona
wharo p-artama in diapnoali occur.

12 3

466

123

4

12 3

4 66

12 3

4
4

71.

u w p i

72.

Inwrprow to dw M W dw it o w

4 86

1 23

73l

i n i up oppofnimonw vddi ohdd* poronw* o odw r ip p w p v iili

12 3

4 86

1 23

4

74.

M m op M f d iw oduwdoim l nwodnpi oM k fn u p i o f p o v n o
to Im m m d w ir knoododpp ofcout d w ir oMMron*! dovotodnMnt*
d w ir ra k m poronw, W .

1 23

4 86

1 23

4

71b

C h o v d i kdonvwtlon suok
d P M d k d porponrwi

12 3

4 66

1 23

4

12 3

4 86

12 3

4

1 23

4 86

1 23

4

75.

iiw it p w n n wwvrmoMon w w i w

h

of dw

rv w y iwm*mnmw

W io d 'i w th o rlty ovor him. 1 2 3

id w d ia sid N tfO M f ond

oM m

d

U m ntm m tM d to dPtor^Mrw lid Pssitnpp ond rooodons oonoornlnp

IW

Aufe

Iha^^m
^w^Qe
rt ^W^^^^Mnlmr

77.

r w p i vno o w n u n w w n o w i

75b

Cxplaina tha aaoya in ertdah a oh8d*e amotiovtal o r aortal problama
o p f a ffto t h it aaadamlo porforaaanoa*

123

4 66

12 3

4

75b

hWarpmta to f o ohNd tha rwtura o f hia paranta* authority om r Mm. 1 2 3

466

123

46

w r iw i

on w onoi

138

IDEAL
LO
HI
13 3
4 66

ACTUAL
LO
HI
1 33
48 E

SOL

Halpa tha dUM ohanga hla ora rt bahador In Ufa afauatlona.

E l.

Works wHh an IndM dud ohlld In a ranw nrtf rdationtolp.

13 3

I t *

13 3

48 E

Explains to dw to fid «toy ha hat baan retarred fo r aoold

133

45 8

13 3

4 88

B2.

WOffc MWtOS*

n iA t i o o m p u t i the roaowm inporm ation questions by fillin g in on checking all the
ANSWER! TH AT APTLY TO YOU.
S3.

ARE YOU:
PI— rnnm Taaohar (You work w tto • oartaln group o f chMdran throughout th * day, and you
ara P a ana p rire rily lu p o n lb lt to r d w ir aduoattonol dawatopmont.)
Nondaaaraom Taatoar IMoat o f Pm children you aarea are anroMad In otoar taachart daaarnnmt.)

Ed. w h m v Hoar long to o you baan a taaahar o f f a amotionulty Impaired?
OB______ If you ara a noudnarapm toodw r, Indicaw tha numbar o f buHdingi you aarea on a regular baaia.
H.

H im Indlaata your undargraduata m ajor._____________________________________________

S?.

Education (ptoma chock aN to o l apply):
BA or EE
MA or ME In Rapitar Education
MA or ME In Epadal Eduaation
M A or MB Otoar
Lam to rn MA

BE.

In what typa o f tatting did you do your atudant taaaWng or praodoum ta r apodaladuootlon oarti floatlon?
Satf-Comainad Oaaaroom ( M fic School)
Raamirna Room |H M e Sahoal)
Mantol In a tiM lo n
Oorreetiond Sddng
Otoar W%mm fe a e ify l

BE.

Oo you tod to ot aahool aoold aworh aaretoala aufRdantly aaoAaA|o to you to r oonaultatton
* ** »■» ■
|m uattc
otbwioum v o t w i n y w F v p v n r

ragartong

YEE
NO
0 0 ._____ Udng tha ratorenaa o f a 10 month aahool yaar, plaaao aadmoaa tha appraiilmaai numbar o f tbuaa you
would hare oonfwonaaa w tto too achod aoald wotoar?
TMM COMPLETES THE QUESTIONNAIRE. PLEASE PEEL FREE TO 00M RM NT ON AN Y OP THE
RESPONSE! YOU HAVE MAOS TO TMM OUSSTIONNAIRS ON THE REVERSE OP TMM PARE.
PLEASE PLACE TMM M l THE RETURN ENVELOPS AND M AIL
THANK YOU POR YOUR COOPERATION.

APPENDIX D
TASK DESCRIPTORS CLUSTERED UNDER EACH FACTOR

APPENDIX D
TASK DESCRIPTORS CLUSTERED UNDER EACH FACTOR
Leadership and Policy Making
Assists in in-service training of teachers or administrators.
Participates in research projects.
Publishes new findings and perspectives on social work
services in the school setting.
Assists in the recruiting of social work personnel.
Assists in the education of social work personnel (e.g.,
field instruction of graduate social work students).
Works actively to obtain increased salaries and improved
working conditions for teachers and other school personnel.
Consults with school administrators in the formation of
administrative policy which directly affects the welfare of
pupils.
Works with school administrators, individually or in groups,
to examine the symptoms and determine causes of problems
in the school system.
Encourages administrators to develop cooperative working
relationships with community agencies.
Helps to bring about new outside-of-school programs through
work with other individuals and community groups.
Accepts responsibilities with a community council or other
planning and coordinating group.
Attends and contributes to meetings of social action groups,
aside from professional social work or education organi­
zations during school hours.
Interprets the nature of school social work services to
other community agencies or interested groups through
speeches, panel discussions, etc.
139

140
Helps interpret: to the community the school administrative
policies which have to do with pupil welfare.
Flans or conducts educational meetings with groups of
parents to increase their knowledge about their children's
development, their role as parents, etc.
Works with groups of parents to organize and channel their
concerns about problems of their school system.
Participates in staffing, even when child is not known to
the social worker, in order to remain familiar with as many
children in the building as possible.
Does informal, long-range follow-ups on completed cases by
talking to teacher, friends, parents, or child.
Casework Services to Parents and Child
Obtains psychiatric, psychological, or social casework
consultations where problems in diagnosis occur.
Obtains from parents information on the child's behavior
at home, and his previous development and experiences.
Consults with other special service personnel to develop and
coordinate an overall treatment approach for the child.
Selects and periodically revises the plan for service and
its goals.
Obtains from various school personnel a description of the
child's problems and his behavior at school, both in and
out of the classroom.
Involves the principal in plans concerning a case and sug­
gests ways he may help deal with the problem.
Helps the child to control or express his feelings appro­
priately.
Helps the child develop new attitudes or modify old ones.
Helps the child to understand his relationship to impor­
tant adults in his life.
Clarifies with the parents the nature of the child's
problem.

141
Helps parents to develop realistic perceptions of their
child's academic potential and performance, his limitations,
and his future.
Helps parents to see how they contribute to their child's
problems (e.g., through their own marital problems, poor
home conditions, or by their particular methods of child
care).
Helps parents to see how they contribute to their child's
growth (i.e., recognize their own particular strengths as
parents).
Educational Counseling to Parents and Child
Interprets to the child the nature of the school's authority
over him.
Interprets to the child the nature of his parents' authority
over him.
Offers factual information to the child and his parent.
Clarifies the school's social and academic expectations and
regulations with the child.
Helps the child develop his educational goals or values.
Offers advice, suggestions,
his parent.

and

direction to the child and

Interprets to the child reasons for his behavior and his
relationship to others.
Helps the child understand his abilities and interests.
Interprets to parents who are ignoring school regulations
the nature of the school's authority and its expectations.
Clarifies with the parents the school's social and academic
expectations and regulations.
Makes suggestions as to how the parents can improve their
relations with his teacher and with his school.
Checks on attendance by making home visits in cases of
prolonged or unexplained absences.

142
Personal Service to the Teacher
Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with
her own personal problems, even though they are not
interfering with her work.
Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with
personal problems where the teacher's own difficulties
prevent her from being effective in her work.
Helps the teacher understand her own personal problems.
Helps teacher plan how she will interpret to the child the
referral for service and the role of the social worker.
Discusses with the teacher the nature of her interactions
with the child.
Acquaints teacher with and encourages her to use community
services, especially those available for her direct use
with the child and his family.
Caseload Management
Sets up appointments with child, parents, or other appro­
priate persons.
Channels information such as referrals, suggestions, and
releases to appropriate personnel.
Supplies information to parents and teachers about welfare
agencies or public health facilities (e.g., location;
application procedures, etc.).
Reviews the child's cumulative record and takes notes on
pertinent information.
Helps teacher discover the child's resources for achieving
success.
Explains the ways in which a child's emotional or social
problems may effect his academic performance.
Maintains required records of social work service, keeps
schedule of activities up to date, and writes reports of
services.

143
interpreting School Social Work Services
Describes to other special service personnel the range of
services the social worker is able to provide.
Describes to principal the range of services the social
worker is able to provide.
Describes to the teacher the nature, objectives, and pro­
cedures of school social work service.
Explains to the child why he has been referred for social
work service.
Makes regular visits to parents to maintain a liaison
between home and school in order to reinforce parents'
interest and concern for their child's school life.
Participates on school committees to improve effectiveness
of all the special services.
Clears referrals with teacher and principal when the
referral has originated elsewhere.
Explains to the child how they will work together (e.g.,
time and place of appointment; the worker's contact with
his teacher and parents).
Liaison Between Family and Community Agencies
Actively encourages child or family to make maximum use of
community resources to which they have been referred, and
gives continuing positive support to them in their attempts.
Obtains from parents information about the family function­
ing.
Assesses the child's functioning in relation to his neigh­
borhood patterns and other cultural influences.
Acts as a liaison between a family and a social agency to
insure that, following referral, service gets underway.
Obtains information from other agencies who have had
experience with the child and/or his family.
Obtains information about the child's medical problems
from family physician.

144
Encourages children and families to ask for and make maxi­
mum use of community "supplementary" or "enabling" services.
Interpreting the Child to the Teacher
Discusses whether the problem is suitable for service.
Assesses the improvement which can be expected in the
child and/or family.
Offers suggestions concerning how to deal with parents.
Distinguishes between normal and problem behavior in a
child.
Helps the teacher recognise possible differences in the
values of the child and teacher.
Clinical Treatment for Children
Helps the child gain insight into his emotional problems.
Helps the child change his overt behavior in life situations.
Works with an individual child in a casework relationship.
Works with groups of children using the group process.
Interviews child to determine his feelings and reactions
concerning his home, his school, and his problems.

APPENDIX E
LETTER TO SPECIAL EDUCATION DIRECTORS INFORMING THEM OF
SURVEY AND ENDORSEMENT BY STATE DEPARTMENT OF
EDUCATION, SPECIAL EDUCATION SERVICES

APPENDIX E
•T A T I

or

MICHIGAN

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
Lonalng, M IcM fon 41903

MBCMMM
O K . OOBTO M I H T M U J I

D K M b t r 13* 1974
ja m b s

p. m a n

Vtm h M ta

O B . M K t lA n . J.
B AS S A B A A . O U H O t X m U l
M A U L T H IR A N U L L Y
A M N B 1T A M L U B
W IL L IA M A . S B O B U U B O
M M U W P P. V A N D B T 1B
OOV

W IL L IA M

Dear Special Education Director
Tha role of the School Social Worker In Michigan 1s undergoing
rapid transfonaatlon due to the expansion of special education
program* Mandatory special education legislation* increased
demnds for service, and the accoapanylng recognition of the
need to explore the scope of school social work services.
Dr.'s Bert Donaldson and Leonora Hamlin of the Michigan De­
partment of Education have been working with Harold Weiner of
Michigan State University on a questionnaire designed to Inves­
tigate the tasks of the school social worker as perceived by both
school social workers and teachers of the amtlonally Impaired.
On or about January 2, 1975* you will be receiving a packet of
questionnaires for distribution to selected school social workers
and teachers of the emotionally Impaired on your staff. You will
be asked to forward these questionnaires to the persons whose names
appear on the accompanying envelopes.
Your cooperation and support will be greatly appreclatad, and we
thank you 1n advance.
Sincerely

Mu
n. Director
Special Education Services

o

.

•~om»

m il u k b m

APPENDIX F
LETTER TO SPECIAL EDUCATION DIRECTORS DESCRIBING
DISTRIBUTION OF SURVEY INSTRUMENT

APPENDIX F

STATE OF MICMOAN

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
Lansing, Michigan 41101

mn

January 2, 1975
ja m b s p .

tnm a.

n» WnMui

OB . M C M A O L J. D M
BARBARA A . D U M O U C H O LLB
M A R IL Y N M A N K B U .Y
a h h b t t a M iu a a
w i lll a m a . mommmma
E D M U N D P. V A N O M T B

OOV

Dm t fpadal Education Diractors

W ILLIAM a . MILLIKBM

IrBHWi

iFrlmM In thli pochago ara a n— bar of anvnlopoa oddraaoad to naubars of your
•toff. Bibbb EaiBlopM contain tha survay lnatru— nt that Mr. Sattan corraspoudad
with you about on Dac— bar 13, 1974. In addition to tha quaatloanalm, lattara of
Introduction and aalf-addroaand ammlop— 'ara Includad. Plaada dlstrlbuta thin
— tarlal to tha paroom whoaa nomas appaar on tha Individual anvalopas.
Thla projact la andoroad by tha Spaclal education Sarvlcaa, Michigan Dapartnant
of Education. It la fait that thla andaavorwillprovlda avaluabla contribution
to fwtura progr— davnlop— nt.
Should any parson no longer ba aoplayad by yourayatan.plan— ratum tbaaa
1—
lanadlately latha anclooad anvnlopa.
Thank, you for your asalotanca and cooparatlon.
Cordially,

X/*/

■*■/

Art Donaldson, Ph.D.
Michigan Dapartnant of Education
Spaclal Education Sarvlcaa

Laonora ■— 11n, Ph.D.
'WAig M Dapartnant of Education
Special Education Sarvlcaa

Harold Hal— r
Crnduata Aaalatant
Michigan Stata Unlvaralty
NOTE:

Please return the questionnaire no later than January 23, 1975.

m/mm

146

APPENDIX G
DISTRIBUTION OF PERCENTAGES FOR PRIORITIES
ASSIGNED ACCORDING TO GROUP MEMBERSHIP,
CONDITION, AND FACTOR

APPENDIX G
DISTRIBUTION OF PERCENTAGES FOR PRIORITIES
ASSIGNED ACCORDING TO GROUP MEMBERSHIP
CONDITION, AND FACTOR

Leadership and Policy Making
SSW

TEI

Assists in in-service training of teachers or administrators.

Ideal
Actual

1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

3

5

9

13

26

44

10

4

20

37

11

18

27

12

25

11

15

10

29

25

30

7

4

4

Helps to bring about new outside-of-school programs thr<
work with other individuals and community groups.
Ideal
Actual

3

6

10

37

15

29

7

5

16

29

30

13

31

18

18

20

6

7

25

30

21

13

8

3

Participates in research projects.
Ideal
Actual

8

2

30

33

8

19

20

10

29

30

6

5

55

18

10

14

2

1

44

16

21

13

0

6

Publishes new findings and perspectives on social work
services in the school setting.
Ideal
Actual

2

5

11

38

15

29

26

11

24

22

10

7

65 15

12

4

2

2

54

20

17

6

1.5

1.5

147

148
SSW

TE1

Accepts responsibilities with a community council or other
planning and coordinating group.

Ideal
Actual

6

1

2

3

4

30

17 28

13

13

23

27

10

8 10

25

29

24

14

1

2

3

4

3

7

15

35 15

22

5

5

6

13 11
1

7

Assists in the recruiting of social work personnel.
Ideal
Actual

9

10

34

44 21

9

9

6

12 29
8

9

18. 5 16
46

29

23
7

18.5 14 10
13

1

4

Assists in the education of social work personnel (e.g.,
field instruction of graduate social work students).
Ideal
Actual

1

7

9

24

13 46

4

10

24

29

17 16

38 12.5 12.5 18

8 11

20

23

18

20

10

9

Works actively to obtain increased salaries and improved
working conditions for teachers and other school personnel.
Ideal
Actual

16 11

21

42 13.5 17

28

8 16

43

16

16

14

7

4

13.5

3 11

59

13

12

10

6

1

Consults with school administrators in the formation of
administrative policy which directly affects the welfare
of pupils.
Ideal
Actual

0 1

8

9

26 19

27

16

20 62
55 6.5

1

6

6

17

33 37

27

19

20

16

7 11

Works with school administrators, individually or in groups,
to examine the symptoms and determine causes of problems
in the school system.
Ideal
Actual

1 3
31 19

5
25

16

24 51

8

6 11

10
27

7

9

25

25.5 25.5 10

30 19
6

6

149
SSW

TEI

Plans or conducts educational meetings with groups of parents
to Increase their knowledge about their children's develop­
ment, their role as parents, etc.

Ideal
Actual

1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

1

3

2

17

23

54

4

6

10

24

32

24

17

10

25

25

11

12

22

22

27

14

11

4

Does informal, long-range follow-ups on completed cases by
talking to teacher, friends, parents, or child.
Ideal
Actual

3
19

8
17

18 13
28

24

34

22.5 4.5

9

3
22

4

10 15

23 18

26

29

39

4

7

Encourages administrators to develop cooperative working
relationships with community agencies.
Ideal
Actual

2

8

12 18

32

28

10

1

16 31

26

16

13 18

27 20

15

7

29

16

25 23

6

1

Interprets the nature of school social work services to
other community agencies or interested groups through
speeches, panel discussions, etc.
Ideal
Actual

3
26

5
17

10 45
21

15.5

7
5

30

10

15.5 30

14

16 21

21 19

19

19

20

7

4

Participates in staffing, even whenchild is not known to
the social worker, in order to remain familiar with as many
children in the building as possible.
Ideal

10

7

16 22

19

26

10

6

13 31

17

23

Actual

27

9

27 16

11

10

27

19

17 17

3

17

Works with groups of parents to organise and channel their
concerns about problems of their school system.
Ideal
Actual

8
45

9
15

19 20
19

11

24

20

6

5

17
41

10
17

14 21
23

10

17

21

4.5

4.5

150
SSW

TEI

Helps Interpret to the community the school administrative
policies which have to do with pupil welfare.

Ideal
Actual

1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

2

8

20

25

19

26

13

9

11

33

15

19

26

24

20

13

8

9

36

14

23

13

4

10

Attends and contributes to meetings of social action groups,
aside from professional social work or education organizations
during school hours.
Ideal
Actual

13 16
51

14.5

16
14.5

27
9

15

13

8

3

27
29

10
23

23 20
24

11

14

9

6

4

Casework Services to Parents and Child
Obtain psychiatric, psychological, or social casework consul­
tations where problems in diagnosis occur.
Ideal

0

2

1

7 14

76

1

0

6

9

30

54

Actual

1

4

8

21 20

46

6

3

16

27

18

30

Clarifies with the parents the nature of the child's problem.
Ideal

0

0

1

6 15

78

1

0

0

7

35

57

Actual

0

1

4

19 32

44

3

6

16

33

21

21

Obtains from parents information on the child's behavior at
home, and his previous development and experiences.
Ideal

0

Actual

0

1

2

4

11

12 23
23

26

62

0

0

36

3

9

6

6

20 18.5

35

53

18.5

31

Consults with other special service personnel to develop and
coordinate an overall treatment approach for the child.
Ideal

0

0

2

6 17

75

0

0

4

10

17

69

Actual

1

6

10

18 21

44

4

3

21

26

23

23

151
SSW

TE1

Helps the child to control or express his feelings appropri­
ately.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

0

0

1

10

18

71

1

1

3

16

22

57

Actual

0

2

8

20

27

43

10

12

21

30

13

14

Helps parents to develop realistic perceptions of their
child's academic potential and performance, his limitations,
and his future.
Ideal

0

0

4

8 19

69

0

3

6

8

24

59

Actual

0

4

10

26 31

29

6

6

28

26

17

17

Helps the child develop new attitudes or modify old ones.
Ideal
Actual

1
0

1

1

1

14

6 21
22 29

70

1

1

34

11.5

9

7

12

24 21.5

32

47

24

10

Selects and periodically revises the plan for service and its
goals.
Ideal

0

3.5

3.5

11 21

61

6

4

Actual

2

8

25

23 16

26

11

20

17 21

29

23

41

16

3

9

Obtains from various school personnel a description of the
child's problems and his behavior at school, both in and out
of the classroom.
Ideal
Actual

0
0

1.5

3.5

10 20

65

0

0

2

5

19 30

44

4.5

4.5

4 13
16

24

29

54

24

27

Helps parents to see how they contribute to their child's
problems (e.g., through their own marital problems, poor
home conditions, or by their particular methods of child
care)•
Ideal

0

0

6

9 19

66

1

1

0

9

27

62

Actual

0

2

14

30 21

33

10

7

11

32

29

11

Involves the principal in plans concerning a case and suggests
ways he may help deal with the problem.

152
SSW

TEI

1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

Ideal

0

0

4

11

21

64

0

0

7

22

27

Actual

0

5

16

26

31

22

9

12

21

23

14

Helps parents to see how they contribute to their child's
growth (i.e., recognize their own particular strengths as
parents).
Ideal

0

0

1

8

13

78

0

0

0

8 32

60

Actual

1

2

7

23

27

40

3

9

16

27 24

21

Helps the child to understand his relationship to important
adults in his life.
Ideal

1

Actual

0
0

2

5

9

11 29.5

20
30.5

65 1.5

1.5

27 7

13

7

17 33

40

27

24 19

10

Educational Counseling to Parents and Child
Interprets to the child the nature of the school's authority
over him.
Ideal

2

Actual

2

7

18

22

9

25 23

15
16

36

7

25 14.5

6

4

10

17

27 26

30

34 14.5

10

Interprets to parents who are ignoring school regulations the
nature of the school's authority and its expectations.
Ideal

7

11

Actual

15 15

16

23

20 20

14
11

29

4

19 7

0

13

19 27

37

16

28

20 16

13

Interprets to the child the nature of his parents' authority
over him.
Ideal

5

11

11

15

16

43

4

1

16

21 29

29

Actual

5

15

10

22

13

35 17

7

29

19 17

11

Clarifies the school's social and academic expectations and
regulations with the child.
Ideal
Actual

3
7

6
8

10
20

20
22

20
18

41 7
25 13

2
4

10
26

26 20
30 11

36
16

153
SSW

TEI

Offers factual information to the child and his parent.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

5

6

Ideal

0

2

6 16

23

53

0

4

3 14 29

50

Actual

0

3

15 27

19

36

4

10

16 26 27

17

4

Clarifies with the parents the school's social and academic
expectations and regulations.
Ideal
Actual

3 4.5
27 12

9 13.5
25 11

26

44 10

4

15

10 29

23

19 37 11
33

74

19
4

Helps the child develop his educational goals or values.
Ideal

3.5 3.5

17 12

20

44 9

4

Actual

2.5 12.5

21 28

17

19 14.5

17

9 24 23
23 24 14.5

31
7

Makes suggestions as to how the parents can improve their
relations with his teacher and with his school.
Ideal

0

6

7 25

20

43

6

3

10 13 37

31

Actual

9 10

25 27

7

22

12

10

34 21 11

12

Offers advice, suggestions, and direction to the child and
his parent.
Ideal

2

5

18 12

18

45

0

1

3 11 33

52

Actual

2

5

19 22.5 22.5 29

3

4

14 27 33

19

Checks on attendance by making home visits in cases of pro­
longed or unexplained absences.
Ideal

24 24

13

9

12

18

11

4

Actual

27 20

18 15

7

13

27

19

9 20 29
16 20

8

27
10

Helps the child understand his abilities and interests.
Ideal

0

1

3 11

19

65

1.5

1.5

Actual

0

2

7 22

26

43

9

6

4 11 32

50

24 24 18.5 18.5

154
SSW

TEI

Interprets to the child reasons for his behavior and his
relationship to others.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

0

2

3

17

24

54

3

1

9

16

30

41

Actual

1

3

10

25

32

29

7

16

23

24

17

13

Personal Service to the Teacher
Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with per­
sonal problems where the teacher's own difficulties prevent
her from being effective in her work.
Ideal
Actual

9

3

11

19

14

44

13

6

16

23

21

21

25

16

24

13

7

15

45

21

14

11

1

6

Helps the teacher understand her own personal problems.
Ideal

18

13

20

17

16

16

26

16

18

21

6

13

Actual

31

24

26

12

7

0

47

20

17

10

3

3

Refers the teacher to a community agency for help with her
own personal problems, even though they are not interfering
with her work.
Ideal

24

9

16

20

10

21

33

14

21

17

12

3

Actual

42

18

13

8

9

10

66

13

14

7

0

0

Acquaints teacher with and encourages her to use community
services, especially those available for her direct use
with the child and his family.
Ideal
Actual

3

8

16

28

24

21

4.5

1.5

10

14

20

50

11

18

23

27

6

15

17

24

21

18

12

8

Discusses with the teacher the nature of her interactions
with the child.
Ideal

0

0

1

10

25

64

0

0

1

20

29

50

Actual

2

3

15

33

22

25

14

13

22

27

10

14

155
SSW

TEI

Helps teacher plan how she will interpret to the child the
referral for service and the role of the social worker.

Ideal
Actual

1

2

3

£

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

6

4

6

25

17

42

6

4

13

10

40

27

10

15

16

25

13

21

20

22

28

14

10

6

Caseload Management
Sets up appointments with child, parents, or other appropriate
persons.
Ideal

2

1

6

12.5

12.5

66

0

1

4 13

29

53

Actual

2

2

7

14

19

56

3

6

8 26

30

27

29

39

20

14

Channels information such as referrals, suggestions, and
releases to appropriate personnel.
Ideal

1

4

11

18

10

56

3

0

Actual

2

3

14

27

11

43

6

3

8 21
18

39

Reviews the child's cumulative record and takes notes on perti­
nent information.
Ideal

7

1

8

16

17

51

1

6

10

26

26

31

Actual

4

6

11

17

19

43

4

10

16

26

27

17

Supplies information to parents and teachers about welfare
agencies or public health facilities (e.g., location; appli­
cation procedures; etc.).
Ideal

1

4

15

17

25

37

0

0

6

21

29

44

Actual

4

16

18

23

21

18

9

16

24

24

14

13

Helps teacher discover the child's resources for achieving
success.
Ideal

0

0

0

Actual

1

3.5

12.5

8

16

76

4.5

4.5

16

21

24

30

37

27

19

18

26

21

13

13

9

156
SSW

TEI

Maintains required records of social work service, keeps
schedule of activities up to date, and writes reports of
services.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

4

1

8

17

24

46

1

0

9

13

26

51

Actual

7 12

10

27

19

25

4

4

12

31

26

23

Explains the ways in which a child's emotional or social
problems may effect his academic performance.
Ideal

0

0

6

10

23

61

4

1.5

Actual

0

0

7

22

28

43

4

9

1.5

10

33

50

20

33

21

13

Interpretingr School Social Work
Describes to principal the range of services the social
worker is able to provide.
Ideal

1

1

3

14

18

63

1

6

4

16

29

44

Actual

6

3

17

23

14

37

14

11

16

23

17

19

Describes to other special service personnel the range of
services the social worker is able to provide.
Ideal

1

2

6

22

16

53

0

1

Actual

3

7

18

30

14

28

7

11

10
34

17

25

47

16

16

16

Describes to the teacher the nature, objectives, and pro­
cedures of school social work service.
Ideal

2

2

6

13

16

61

1

6

4

24

Actual

6

6

19

27

12

30

17

16

26

18

29

36

7 16

Explains to the child why he has been referred for social
work service.
Ideal

1

2

0

8

14

75

4

3

4

11

24

53

Actual

2

2

6

10

25

55

9

11

24

20

13

23

157
SSW

TEI

Hakes regular visits to parents to maintain a liaison between
home and school in order to reinforce parents* interest and
concern for their child's school life.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

1

2

8

17

18

54

1

0

5

16

24

54

Actual

8

10

19

29

14

20

11

23

19

23

11

13

Participates on school committees to improve effectiveness of
all the special services.
Ideal

0

Actual

20

2

9

13 32

17

26

46

4

4

13

31

16

9

10

21

16

23

21

22

26

9 10

Clears referrals with teacher and principal when the referral
has originated elsewhere.
Ideal

4.5

Actual

3

7 4.5

20

9

55

4

6

13

13

6

27

10

44

9

17

21

20

10

21

43

9 24

Explains to the child how they will work together (e.g., time
and place of appointment; the worker's contact with his
teacher and parents).
Ideal

0

6

0

10

17

67

1

1

10

19

16

53

Actual

1

6

7

20

21

43

10

7

24

17

20 22

Liaison Between Family and Community Agencies
Obtains from parents information about the family functioning•
Ideal

0

1

3

8

16

72

0

0

7

10

27 36

Actual

0

2

6

26

25

81

1

9

17

21

26 26

Assesses the child's functioning in relation to his neighbor­
hood patterns and other cultural influences.
Ideal

0

2

2

20

27

49

1

1

3

27

32 36

Actual

7

8

13

23

28

21

6

13

30

21

19 11

158
SSW

TEI

Actively encourages child or family to make maximum use of
community resources to which they have been referred, and
gives continuing positive support to them in their attempts.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

0

2

1

12

25

60

0

0

3

14

23

60

Actual

2

3

13

26

19

37

1

10

23

31

16

19

Acts as a liaison between a family and a social agency to
insure that, following referral, service gets underway.
Ideal

1

3

8

14

17

57

0

0

1

12

30

57

Actual

3

6

12

27

17

35

4

7

23

26

21

19

Obtains information from other agencies who have had exper­
ience with the child and/or his family.
Ideal

0 4.5

Actual

1

3

4.5

20

17

54

0

0

1

5

28

20

43

0

6

12

7

32

60

28 27 27

Obtains information about the child's medical problems from
family physician.
Ideal

0

8

7

17

20

48

1

0

10

10 27 52

Actual

5

11

12

25

19

28

7

7

16

22 24 24

Encourages children and families to ask for and make maximum
use of community "supplementary" or "enabling" services.
Ideal

0

2

2

9

23

64

0

1

7

12 33 47

Actual

1

3

14

34

21

27

7

7

22

20 23 16

Interpreting the Child to the Teacher
Assess the improvement which can be expected in the child
and/or family.
Ideal

0

2

8

14

28

48

10

6

7

21 24 32

Actual

2

6

23

31

20

18

14

8

30

26 12 10

159
SSW

TEI

Offers suggestions concerning how to deal with parents.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

ideal

0

0

4

26

23

47

0

1

1

12

42

44

Actual

2

8 17

32

20

21

7

13

26

21

20

13

.

Discusses whether the problem is suitable for service!
Ideal

2

2

4

14

17

61

4

3

8

26

23

36

Actual

4

6 17

18

18

37

7

11

19

27

17

19

Distinguishes between normal and problem behavior in a
child.
Ideal

0

1

4

9

14

72

4

2

8

17

27

42

Actual

1

4

7

20

26

72

7

8

14

26

22

23

Helps the teacher recognize possible differences in the
values of the child and teacher.
Ideal

0 1

8

Actual

4 6 21

12

14

65

1

3

6

26 31

33

24

19

26 10

26

19

24 13

8

Clinical Treatment for Children
Works with an individual child in a casework relationship.
Ideal

4 0

8

24

16

48

3

0

6

21 13

57

Actual

2 1

8

26

20

43 10

7

21

21 19

22

Helps the child gain insight into his emotional problems.
Ideal

1 7

3

Actual

3 8 15

9

17

63 1.5

1.5

8

4 26

59

29

18

27 13

13

20

23 21

10

Helps the child change his overt behavior in life situations.
Ideal
Actual

1

2

0 2

0
5

11
34

17
29

61

1.5

30 11

4

1.5

10

22

20

23

26 14

50
17

160
SSW

TEI

Interviews child to determine his feelings and reactions
concerning his home, his school, and his problems.
1

2

3

4

5

6

1

2

3

4

5

6

Ideal

0

1

1

8

15

75

1

0

1

9

23

66

Actual

0

0

2

18

18

62

4.5

4.5

13

24

27

27

Works with groups

of children using the group process.

Ideal

3

1

3

19

24

50 4

3

10 13

31

Actual

9 11

28

18

10

24 27

11.5

13 24

11.5 13

39

APPENDIX H
COVER LETTER TO SCHOOL SOCIAL WORKERS

APPENDIX H
STATK OP MICHIGAN

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
lam in g , Michigan 41902

January 2, 1975

•oaaa

m a cMMH

oit. o o k t o m k i m w u n
IAM BS 9 . O 'N EIL
OK. M ICHAEL J. M i l
EAREAKA A . DUMOUCHELLE
MARILYN JEAN KELLY
ANNETTA MILLER
WILLIAM A. SEDER EURO
EDM UND F. VANOCTTB
OOV WILLIAM O. MILLIKEN

bam
—

Daar School Social Worker:

Tho rola of tha School Social Worker In Michigan la undergoing rapid tranafomatlon
dua to tha aapanalon of Special Education prograne, Mandatory Special Education
lagielatloo, lncroaaod dananda for eerrlce, and tha accoopanylng racognltlon of
tha naod to anplora tha scopa of achool aoclal work aarvlcaa. Attached la a
quaatlonnalre that will ba collated by a aalactad group of achool aoclal workara
In Michigan. Tha purpoae of thla atudy la to imeatlgata tha taaka of tha achool
aoclal worker mm perceived by-both achool aoclal workara and taaehara of tha
EMOtlooally lapalrad.
Tha quaetloonalre la aalf-axplanatory and can ba filled out In a abort period of
tlaa. All raapoaaaa ara coapletely confidential, no feel frae to eapreaa your
trwa faallnga.
Ha have Included for your uae a genuine and authentic, but naadlaaa to aay,
laaapenalwe pen which you nay heap upon coapletlon of tha aurvey. In addition,
wa have Included a place of candy (reward) which wa hope you will enjoy during
the tlna you ara filling out tha quaatlonnalre. Pleaae taka a few nlnutea right
now to fill thla out and return the aurvey to ua la tha ancloaad atanpod envelope.
Thank you for your prompt attention and cooperation.
Cordially.

Eert Donaldeon, Ph.D.
Michigan Departnant of Education
Special Education Servlcea

Leonora faalin, Ph.D.
Michigan Departnant of Education
Special Education Servlcaa

y/tU)
Harold Helaar
Graduate Aaalatant
Michigan State Dnlveralty
NOTE:
onurea

Pleat* return the questionnaire no later than January 23. 1975

161

APPENDIX I
COVER LETTER TO TEACHERS OF THE
EMOTIONALLY IMPAIRED

APPEHDIX I
STATC O f MICHIGAN

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
lam ing, Michigan 4*903
M0CMIO9t

January 2, 1975

oa. aowTOM

m

i mmm ih

v. man
nm fcii
oa. MKMABL i. Data
ja m o b

IA H IA IU A.

D U M O U C H IU I

ffcsMsanr
M A R IL Y N IR A N K E LLY

AMNK1TA M lU IH
WILLIAM A. ttO U B U M
■OMUND P. VAMDC1TI
OOV. WILLIAM O, MILLIKKN

faflHMfc

Dur Teacher of tha feutlonalljr lapaired:
Tha rola of tha School Social Worker la Michigan la taidergoing rapid tranafumotion
dua to tha expansion of Special Education program, Mandatory Special Education
laglalatioa. Increased danands for service, and tha accompanying racognltlon of
tha naad to a^lora tha acopa of achool adclal work servlcea. Attached la a
quest! rmnolrs that will ha cospleted by a oalactad group of teachers of tha
aanflnaally b^alrad In Michigan. The purpose of thla study la to Investigate
tha taaka of tha achool aoclal worker aa perceived by both school social workara and
teachers of tha anotlonally lnpalrod.
Tha questionnaire la self-explanatory and can be filled out in a abort period
of tin. All responses ara conplately confidential, so fsal free to express your
true feelings.
Ms have Included for your use a genuine and authentic, but needless to say,
Inexpensive pan which you nay keep upon coapletlon of tha survey. In addition,
we haws included a place of candy (reward) which wo hope you will enjoy during
the tins you ara filling out tha questionnaire. Please taka a few nlmites right
now to fill thla out and return tha survey to us In tha enclosed staged envelope.
Thank you for your prenpt attention and cooperation.
Cordially,

Leonora Ensile, Ph.D.
Michigan Departnant of Education
Special Education Servlcea

Michigan Departnant of Education
Special Education Sarvices
%

Harold Weiner
Graduate Aaalatont
Hlchlgan State University
■I/an
urea

NOTE:

Plaasa return tha questionnaire no later than January 23, 1975

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

I

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Bases for Service Delivery." Florida State Uni­
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________ , and Krishef, Curtis H. "Another Perspective on
Tasks in School Social Work." Social Casevork 54
(December 1973): 591-600.
Barker, Robert L . , and Briggs, Thomas L. "Trends in the
Utilization of Social Work Personnel: An Evalu­
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National Association of Social Workers, 1966.
(Mimeographed.)
Beck, Robert H . , ed. Society and the Schools: Communication
_________
Challengeange
toto
Education
Edt_____ ___________
and Social Work.
New
Mew YYork: National Association of Social Workers,
1965.
Berlin, Irving N. "The School Social Worker as Mental
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Pacific Northwest Regional Institute, Seattle,
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(Mimeographed.)
Coleman, Thomas W . , and Mazzei, Dessa.
"Survey of Reim­
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Costin, Lela B. "Adaptations in the Delivery of School
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"An Analysis of the Tasks in School Social
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"An Analysis of the Tasks in School Social
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164
Costin, Lela B. "A Historical Review of School Social
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________ . "School Social Work Tasks— Implications for
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Cunningham, Mary. Publications Committee, Social Work in
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—

. "State Level Leadership, Administration and
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