2025-2026 Graduate Catalog
Social Work
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Return to: NewYork-Presbyterian Iona School of Health Sciences
Faculty:
Professor/Chair: J. Matich-Maroney; Program Director/Assistant Professor: B. Lynch; Director of MSSW Practicum Education/Clinical Lecturer: K. Quinones
Social Work
The Social Work Department offers a 60-credit MS in Social Work degree (beginning in Fall 2026) designed to prepare graduates for liberatory social work practice excellence in interprofessional settings. We define liberatory social work as the action-oriented practice of partnering with those impacted by injustice and oppression, facilitating recognition of their innate strengths and promoting their power to make the world a more just place. The two-year full-time program is structured as a cohort learning model, with students advancing through the scaffolded curriculum together. Interprofessional education (IPE) is a signature feature of the NYP-I School of Health Sciences MS in Social Work Program and as such, students have the unique experience of learning “with, from and about” students from seven other professional disciplines through their engagement in shared IPE modules over the course of their four semesters at Iona.
The MS in Social Work curriculum begins in fall semester with a courseload that emphasizes the processes of shared community-building and cultivating professional social work identity as students establish a foundation of knowledge about the profession’s values and ethics, its theoretical foundations, systematic planned change process, basic interviewing skills, as well as those of interprofessional collaborative practice. The second semester (spring) builds upon the knowledge and skills of the first while adding a 200-hour social work practicum in one of the program’s IPE partner sites. Structured as a rotational practicum, Practicum I is intended to introduce/onboard students to the full interprofessional practice setting where they will complete the more intensive practicum of the second year and to provide a forum for the application of generalist social work competencies to the actual practice of social work. The third and fourth semesters of second year comprise lighter courseloads but increase practicum time (350 hours/semester) and professional expectations through students’ engagement in Practicum II & III. The emphasis of the second year is on integration/synthesis of theory/practice, the scaffolding of interprofessional social work collaboration skills, as well as the consolidation of professional identity as a master’s-level social worker who is both liberatory social work and interprofessional collaborative practice-ready.
Unique Program Features:
- Learning community cohort model
- First semester all coursework (no practicum)
- Interprofessional collaborative practice specialized year
- Interprofessional partner sites hosting groups of students
- Engagement in the University’s formal Interprofessional Education (IPE) curriculum with students from 7 other disciplines
- 4-day/week practicum experience in the 2nd year
- Anti-racism woven throughout explicit and implicit curricula (content + context)
- Simulated preparation for licensing exam
- Faculty mentorship groups with a focus on consolidating professional identity as liberatory social workers
ProgramsMaster of Science
Return to: NewYork-Presbyterian Iona School of Health Sciences
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