Introduction
The micro-level of social work, often referred to as the traditional approach, entails working in close collaboration with individuals, families, and small groups to strengthen one-on-one support as they navigate complicated multidimensional challenges. In this setting, social workers usually deal with individuals that struggle with various issues, such as loss of financial security or job, of a community, or a place of sacred worship. The individuals that have suffered loss usually deal with scarcity issues, such as the lack of community support, the lack of income, or the lack of food or housing. Therefore, social workers who engage with such individuals on the micro-level are expected to provide support and guidance to individuals within the community and support solution-based programs for improving quality of life through individual- and group-specific services.
Main body
In the local community of Atlanta, Georgia, the governmental agency available at the micro-level is the Department of Human Services, located at 40 Courtland St NE, Atlanta, GA. The structure of the organization is represented by the Director at the very top of the hierarchy, followed by the Assistant to the Director. The organization also has a Chief Operating Officer, a General Counsel, a Director of Communications and Outreach, and other personnel that ensure the provision of consistent social services to the population. The organization works with groups that need help applying for financial support, finding homes and community services for older adults, applying for or renewing benefits, as well as accessing disability and non-discrimination rights. At the micro-level of providing social services, it is possible to collaborate with the agency to promote self-sufficiency among clients, strengthen the levels of safety, and improve the well-being of the members of the community (Andermann, 2016). Working on a case-by-case basis, the agency has been instrumental in guiding populations in the direction of improved life quality.
When dealing with clients that require the support of the organization, it is essential for social workers to strengthen strategic partnerships with the organization and use the available technologies to improve the delivery of services. Strategic partnerships are important because they allow the establishment of a higher quality of services by strengthening social workers’ influence on their clients and improving services for community members of different ages. It is also vital to make sure that the social workers appointed to deal with specific individuals understand the challenges they face and can effectively communicate with the organization to come up with strategies to address their needs.
A client that can potentially seek the assistance of the Department of Human Services is an older adult that has some disabilities or health issues that prevent them from safely living on their own. The organization will take applications for social services offered to such clients and make a referral to healthcare or assistance living institutions that can help administer appropriate care that is patient-focused and comprehensive. Besides, social workers will contact the client’s close relatives, if possible, to negotiate the proper plan of intervention as well as obtain consent. It is also necessary to note that legal services may have to be provided to the population due to drafting legal documents or giving counseling on clients’ rights. The aim of the organization when serving clients of older age is concerned with making sure that they are in a safe environment conducive to good life quality and overall happiness and satisfaction.
Considering the importance of spirituality to some members of society, it is necessary to take into account the available faith-based organizations that operate on the micro level within a designated community. In the context of the community in question, the Faith Center of Atlanta represents a faith-based organization that is widely available to all members of the community. The Faith Center is located in Tucker, which is just north of the city and is led by Pastor Vincent Campbell. The center’s uniqueness lies in the fact that it is a multicultural and nondenominational church for people, regardless of their background, to develop a meaningful relationship with God. The mission statement of the organization mentions that the doors of the church are open to anyone, “whether you’re single or desire marriage ministry,” “business owner or an educator looking for your ministry,” “whether you have a Pentecostal or Baptist background or no church background at all” (“We are the Faith Center,” 2021, para. 1). Therefore, by welcoming and accepting individuals of all backgrounds, the organization allows creating a sense of community and belonging that is often desired by many.
A hypothetical client that may engage with the organization can be a widower whose wife recently died from COVID-19. The individual will likely experience severe grief and loneliness and needs a support system in which he will feel accepted, understood, and comforted. It has been a great challenge for social workers to help clients who have recently lost their loved ones to the coronavirus because the cases are counted in thousands, and it is complicated to ensure that the needs and expectations of every person are met. Because of this, a referral to a faith-based organization may be needed. More importantly, social workers themselves had to deal with the grief of losing their loved ones, which made them poorly equipped when addressing the challenge.
Thus, the spiritual guidance that the Faith Center of Atlanta can provide to its members is an immeasurable benefit for enriching the lives of grieving individuals and helping them recover from severe states. Social workers engaging with the client in the faith-based agency should pay close attention to the needs of the individual and determine whether the agency can help address them. In some instances of grief, it is important to conduct a mental health assessment to ensure that there are no underlying conditions or recently-developed anxiety or depressive symptoms (Clark et al., 2017). Only clients that a mentally healthy in the clinical sense can gain the benefits of faith-based services to deal with grief. Besides, the person-in-environment perspective should be applied to understand the individual in light of the environmental influences that surround them (Tyler, 2020). Therefore, if the environment around the grieving client is conducive to well-being, it is more likely that the client will benefit from engaging with the services at the Faith Center of Atlanta.
In evaluating the quality and quantity of services allocated to address the target problem, it is recommended for the organization to ensure that the faith-based services provide the comfort and support needed for the client to alleviate the burden of grief from losing a loved one. While it is complicated to measure quantitatively the services provided by a faith-based organization, it is important to consider the number of group meetings that the client visits while also recording his level of satisfaction and engagement. Depending on the quality of interactions that the client experiences at the faith-based institutions, it is possible to strengthen the individual’s support from the environment, which, in turn, will help resolve the challenges that he encountered as a result of the loss.
Finding a private social work agency in Atlanta has been challenging because the majority of institutions operate based on governmental support and funding. However, Social Work p.r.n. Working in Atlanta, Georgia supports other organizations by offering assistance in terms of temporary staffing, temporary to permanent staffing, training, and education, as well as consultations. In the organization’s name, “p.r.n.” is translated from Latin as “as needed.” Therefore, the mission of the agency is to fill the gaps in the social service providers as needed, with business partnerships with clients being developed on the basis of high-quality relationships. The assistance provided by the organization is vital to other institutions operating in the area because it allows for filling gaps in staffing, expanding the work of some services, setting up new programs, as well as providing interim personnel.
The client of the organization can be represented by a community social work center that lacks social workers to address the urgent needs of the populations residing in the area. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, underserved populations may experience additional socioeconomic challenges, such as the loss of a steady income, difficulty paying for housing and food, as well as the lack of resources to access high-quality healthcare services. As the number of social workers has not been increasing as a result of the pandemic and fewer professionals are available, it may be a good idea to strengthen staffing to allow addressing the needs of as many people as possible (Redondo-Sama et al., 2020). Social Work p.r.n. can help to fill the gaps in staffing to ensure that there are enough social workers available in the specific community.
When working with the client in the agency, it is necessary to analyze the gaps in personnel and draw connections to the outcomes for the population. The social worker will engage with the agency and collect information on the number of workers available to address social issues and compare the findings to the expected number of staff needed to cover the needs of the target population. When applying the person-in-environment theory, gathering information on clients is imperative as it can provide the foundation for knowledge and support the efforts of organizing the information (Tyler, 2020). Such information will help understand the gaps in social work practice and allow measuring the quality and quantity of services for the target problem.
Conclusion
To conclude, micro-level social work initiates change on an individual case-by-case basis, which is why it is important to have a grasp on the core concepts of practice to meet the needs of the population. The exploration of micro-level social work showed that agencies that operate at this level all consider the immediate environment of their clients to address their target challenges. Considering the fact that there are limitations in providing high-quality social services to populations in need, it is necessary to measure the response rates to the population’s issues and meet the demand for workers.
References
Andermann, A., & CLEAR Collaboration (2016). Taking action on the social determinants of health in clinical practice: A framework for health professionals. CMAJ: Canadian Medical Association Journal, 188(17-18), E474–E483.
Clark, L., Cuthbert, B., Lewis-Fernandez, R., Narrow, W., & Reed, G. (2017). Three approaches to understanding and classifying mental disorder: ICD-11, DSM-5, and the National Institute of Mental Health’s Research domain criteria (RDoC). Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 18(2), 72-145.
Redondo-Sama, G., Matulic, V., Munté-Pascual, A., & de Vicente, I. (2020). Social work during the COVID-19 crisis: Responding to urgent social needs. Sustainability, 12, 1-16.
Tyler, S. (2020). Human behavior and the social environment I. University of Arkansas.
We are the Faith Center. (2021).