Journey to Social Work: A Political Science Perspective

Educational Experience. My path to McGill University took a slight detour in the beginning; I started with a Bachelor degree in Political Science at Ryerson University. My advisor and one of my professors commended my success in the program and shared his observations on my liberal and social justice perspectives and suggested that I explore direct social work (this is also when I learnt the difference between direct and in-direct social work). As a political analyse, he proposed that social workers were being sought after in policy development and that he saw that I would succeed in this field and directed me toward his colleague who has a Master’s degree in Social Work. The process in Ontario to become a social worker is long and it took me a couple months of weighing options and investigating the opportunities a social work degree would avail to me. At last, I came to the decision that combining political science with social work was my comfort area and started the long path through a two-year

As I mentioned earlier, at the beginning of the BSW program I was still primarily activist and policy minded and that was the only thing I wanted to do, now I have more of an interest in clinical work and an awakened curiosity and attraction to investigating where issues stem from for adults and how to prevent prevent/manage the long-term affects trauma and intergenerational trauma have on mental health. With the recent influx of refugees it seems that there will be more opportunities to practice with those who are challenged by trauma and stressor-related disorders and to still work as an activist or in policy development (international social work context) that better support holistic treatments for mental