International Social Work at Nepal School of Social Work: Struggles & Strategies

Abstract

This paper comes out of the personal interviews & work experiences of the authors with Nepal School of Social Work between 2012-2013. The history of social work education and training in Nepal is rather nascent. NSSW is a joint initiative of Kadambari Memorial College of Science and Management (affiliated to Purbanchal University) and Nepal College of Development Studies (affiliated to Tribhuwan University). NSSW is aiming to carve out a niche for its training and advocacy as an open learning institution of social work with its double strategy to achieve international social work standards while practicing indigenous social work and praxis. Social work education and teaching has been a challenging task in Nepal due to various economic and political reasons. At the same time Nepalese society needs professionally qualified Social Workers as it is restricting its society and declared as a republic in 2008.

This paper taking Nepal as a context and Nepal School of Social Work as a case study tries to explore how a school of social work can act as a catalyst for change through developing professionally qualified Social workers. It is divided into different sections such as 1. historical roots & formation of NSSW, 2. major struggles and strategies, 3. efforts to develop Indigenous model of Social work practice and 4 a conclusion and relevance for Indian social work schools.