Mason Groups Celebrate World Social Work Day

By Broadside Staff Reporter Sonya Hudson

In honor of World Social Work Day last Tuesday, the Mason Social Work Student Association with the National Association of Social Workers sponsored an event in which two social work organizations were represented and explained their work.

Friends of Guest House is a Virginia-based organization that helps women who have recently been released from prison start their lives again. The East African Center for the Empowerment of Women and Children is an international organization that helps women and children of Kenya better their lives.

Located in Alexandria, Va., Friends of Guest House is a house that serves as a temporary place that provides services for women who have recently been let out of prison. The executive director of the Guest House, Kari Galloway, is a social worker who specializes in incarcerated women.

Along with Galloway, five women who are either graduates or students of the Guest House, shared their stories. All of them acknowledged that Guest House has changed their lives and without this establishment and the social workers who run it, they would either be out on the street doing what they know how to do or back in prison.

Most of these women had been involved in abusive relationships. Some of these women had been molested and raped as children by family members. Most began their lives of crime at a young age, in their teens. Their crimes included prostitution, use and selling of drugs and shoplifting.

After getting out of jail, many of these women were ostracized from their families, had little education, little job experience and no money.

The Guest House offers assistance during this transitional period between prison and the real world to ten lucky women at a time.

These women offered advice for students in the audience. They advised future social workers to be patient and not quick to give up on people, be honest and trustworthy, reach out and be open-minded, pay attention and listen and believe what people tell you.

Galloway advised future social workers to be careful of becoming too involved in cases. She compared the work of social workers to holding an egg.

Social workers must hold an egg, their cases, carefully so that it does not break.

“The ability to be sensitive and intuitive but not be crushed,” Galloway said, is imperative to being a successful social worker.

Based on Galloway’s advice, social workers should be careful to not become too involved in individual cases and take the job home because results show that workers will burn out quickly and not be able to help as many people.

Galloway noted that 65 to 70 percent of women in prison have children and that reestablishing relationships with family after getting out is the single most important factor for women not returning to jail.

Galloway concluded by acknowledging her admiration of these women. They don’t all have high school educations or GED’s but they have a “Ph.D. in life and survival,” Galloway said. Speaking to groups, like Mason students, affect people’s lives and make changes.

Galloway ended her portion of the discussion with a plea for future social workers to change the system and get involved in programs like Friends of Guest House.

After the women from Friends of Guest House finished their presentation, Theresa Wilson, the president of the East African Center for the Empowerment of Women and Children, a social work program based in Kenya and commonly referred to as EAC, spoke of the importance of this organization.
“Social work is all about empowering different populations,” Wilson said.

The EAC program pledges to help women and children of communities in Kenya.

As of now, this program provides an elementary education through the fourth grade.

In addition, the EAC program is also increasing the number of levels of education offered to the children of Kenya.

Unlike the overcrowded, under-budgeted public schools in the area, EAC’s school is capped at 30 students, with at least half female, per teacher and is constantly expanding their resources in buildings and teachers.

EAC also takes the responsibility to teach mothers basic health care.

They address such illnesses as diarrhea, malaria, which is the biggest killer in Kenya, pneumonia and worms. This program also provides preventative measures for maternal-child transmission of AIDS.

EAC constantly takes volunteers and interns to help maintain their program. EAC has ties with the University of Washington and the University of Oregon, offering these students opportunities for social work internships.
Wilson highlights the importance of international social work.

Women’s status in Kenyan society is elevating and respect for females is increasing. Wilson is empowered by the women and children of Kenya.

“That magic within all of us,” Wilson said, “can be found when working with people in a real and basic way.”

Overall, Mason’s Social Work Student Association hosted an informing event to celebrate World Social Work Day to positively affect students. The organization hopes that these speakers have encouraged Mason students to become social workers and make a difference in lives either in the states or in other countries.