Master of Social Work - Virtual Information Session

Good afternoon everyone. Thank you so much for joining us. We're gonna give everybody just a moment to log in and make sure that you all have sound and and are ready to go. So just give us 1 moment. Thank you again for being here.

All right, we're going to go ahead and get started. Thank you all again for attending. My name is Jen Radwanski, and I'm the Associate director for Graduate Admissions here at Stockton University. And I am joined by my colleague, Dr. Barney, who is part of our Master of Social Work program. And we're here to tell you just a little bit more about this program and why you should apply to be a part of this fantastic program. So before we kick off, I do want to just talk about a few little housekeeping items #1.

I know that you probably have lots of questions and our job is to try and make sure we answer all of those questions.

The end of this session, and we will do that. However, you'll notice on the right hand side of your screen there is a chat feature and you can drop your questions into the chat. But we would encourage you to do so at the very end of the presentation for those of you who are watching live. Because more than likely we will get to all of your questions with all of the slides that we have for you today. If you're watching this virtually. And for those who are who are watching it live, at the very end, we will also give you our contact information. So if you think of questions after you watch the session or again if you're not watching it live with us.

You have the ability to reach out with additional questions too. In that chat. We would also encourage you to not post any personal information or any personal question information you do have. Please reach out to us individually because we will be recording this and sharing this with others, umm, after the session has been completed. So save those personal questions, umm, for an e-mail that you can send to either one of us after our session concludes. So without further ado, Doctor Barney, I'm going to turn things over to you and thank you for joining us today.

Thank you so much. Let me also just join in welcoming you all to the 2025 Stockton University MSW Virtual Information session. So excited to have you all here and I'm excited to see all of the interest that we have in the program for the upcoming year.

As we begin today's session, I thought it would be helpful just to kind of take a step back from our program for a moment and talk with you a little bit about what social work is. A part of the reason why I want to do this is because I recognize that we're going to have people viewing this video.

And who will be participating in today's session who come from a variety of different backgrounds and perspectives. Some of you will come into our program having completed an undergraduate degree in social work. Some of you may have completed a few courses in social work, while others may not have done any social work related course content at all. So again, I want to make sure just to get us all on the same page. So just to answer this question, what is social work? Social work is a profession that's dedicated.

Helping the most disadvantaged members of society. We operate as professionals under a code of ethics that emphasizes human relationships, helping individuals, and more specifically, helping to meet the unmet needs of the members of our society. Now not only do we provide direct practice to help address these unmet needs, but we also function as advocates on behalf of our clients. So.

Working in direct practice, but we also function as advocates at our agencies, in our communities, and even amongst the government to advocate for the needs of the marginalized and disadvantaged members of our society. Now, even though we are unified by this common cause and this purpose, you're going to find that social workers operate in a variety of different fields.

And in a variety of different settings. Before starting my career as a faculty member at Stockton University, I actually worked as an international social worker.

My work was actually based in Africa where I was doing kind of public health related social work. I worked within the field of HIV AIDS to address the treatment and the care related concerns of persons living with HIV AIDS. And we also collaborated with community organizations to help deliver prevention related activities. Now that's not the only career option for social workers. You're going to find that social workers operate in a variety.

Other settings we have social workers who work in hospital settings. They help to.

The needs of children.

Provide discharge planning for individuals, perhaps low income individuals who have needs that that have to be addressed when they leave the hospital, perhaps relating to nutrition, medication, ongoing care, perhaps needs from patient assistance programs. You're going to find that there are social workers who operate in school settings who help to address.

And families in the local community, they may be education related concerns, mental and behavioral health, and the list goes on from there. There's social workers who function within the field of child welfare, helping to address issues such as child abuse and neglect. And again, the the the broader needs of families within the child welfare system.

I've already talked to you about my experience in relation to International Development, as well as some of the community work that I had done.

There are others who engage in this quite regularly using grassroots approaches, making sure that it's approaches to address community needs that arise from within the communities themselves. I'd also talked a little bit about our advocacy related roles and you're going to find that there are some social workers who do that on a full time basis and some social workers who incorporate that into their regular work.

We have social workers who operate within the criminal justice system.

Some who work at prisons to address needs, especially as individuals are released from prisons. We have social workers who work in conjunction with law enforcement to ensure that the needs of mental health related needs, the economic needs and so on of those individuals are addressed within those settings. Similar approaches in military social work. And then the last big field that I want to highlight for you.

Where social workers operate is.

Within the clinical realm, what we sometimes refer to as mental health, social work or behavioral health. Now what I found over the past couple of years is that we've had a number of students or an increased number of students with interest in clinical social work. So let me talk a little bit about what that looks like and what licensing looks like for social workers, both general licensing as well as clinical licensing.

Umm so basically there are two types of licenses that are available to social workers after they graduate with their MSW degree. The 1st is known as the license, umm, social worker, umm, and, and that's a specific license for somebody who has graduated from an MSW program. You would be expected to take a test. Umm, you can actually take the test during your final semester in an MSW program and that will allow you to operate as a licensed social worker.

There are a number of agencies within the state of New Jersey that would require the LSW license to be able to operate as a social worker and others that don't, but our program will help prepare you and give you the knowledge needed for that particular license. The second major type of license is known as the Licensed Clinical Social Worker.

A LCSW is somebody who is able to offer counseling and therapy. You do have to have your MSW degree to be able to.

Go up for your LCSW and basically you're doing counseling and therapy, but you're allowed to do it independently. So you don't have to be supervised by another counselor or someone like that. LCS WS can be reimbursed through health insurance companies through Medicare and through Medicaid. They really make up a large component of the mental health field, especially here in the state of New Jersey. So if you if you have.

Becoming a therapist or a counselor, the LCSW may be an option for you now. How do you get your LCSW? I'd already talked with you about the LSW and how you can do that immediately after graduating with an MSW. An LCSW is a little bit different, and LCSW requires you to have your MSW degree. So we talked about that and that's something that you could obtain through Stockton University, but then you're also expected to have 3000 hours of supervised counseling.

After you graduate with your MSW, and that's true for all LCSW, basically you have to work for at least two years under supervision of another LCSW and then you can qualify for the LCSW. Now you're expected to also complete 12 hours of coursework that's focused in on clinical social work. And those are the types of classes that we provide here at Stockton University's MSW program.

And I'll also just share that we've had a number of our students who have gone on to complete not only their LSW's, but others who have gone on to complete their LCS WS and who are successfully working as counselors and LCS WS in the field right now. All right, So those are some of the broad strokes components of what social work is, opportunities for work within the field of social work. Next what I want to do is I want to narrow down a little bit further and talk about.

Our program and some of the specifics of our program, our program is made-up of a core group of faculty who are experts within their field. So I already talked about how my expertise is in the area of international social work, cross cultural social work. We have other faculty members who have expertise in the area of child welfare, some who have expertise in the area of.

Immigration.

Cross cultural issues. Diversity.

We have some who have a strong focus on clinical social work providing mental health services. There are others who focus in on technology within the field of social work. We also have a number of part-time instructors or adjunct instructors who work full time within the field of social work but make contributions by teaching a few courses for us, which really helps to ensure that.

We're we're having course content that's linked to what's going on in practice.

Umm, and in the everyday realities of social work. And then finally we have some additional individuals, umm, who are staff members, umm, who help provide support, umm, especially as it relates to practicum or what other professions will sometimes refer to as internships. We're going to talk a little bit more about that in just a few minutes. Umm, we'll, so we'll make sure to come back to that and examine what some of our requirements are in relation to practical placements.

Now, umm, let me also just talk a little bit about the history of our program. So I've kind of introduced, umm, our faculty, umm, fields of expertise. Umm, our program has been in operation since 2009. Umm, we've been offering all of our classes in Atlantic City since the start of our program. Uh, for any of those of you who are with us who have maybe been to Stockton and its main campus, maybe taking classes there.

One thing that you'll know is that Stockton University's main campus is located in Galloway in the middle of the Pinelands Reserve, but we have a couple of different satellite campuses, one of which is based in Atlantic City. We offer all of our MSW classes there and we were really strategic in choosing this location because we wanted to make sure that we were linked to the local community where a number of our students will be providing services, where they operate and where other social workers.

Are in.

Constant demand and and offer their services. So we've been really intentional about that. And one of the great things is that the Scarpa Academic Center was built just a few years ago and it really is a modern state-of-the-art facility with computer labs and classrooms. There's residential halls down there, restaurants where students are able to eat. So it's a great place to be holding our classes.

Now, in terms of our program, our purpose and our aim is to offer a curriculum that develops practitioners.

And the practitioners that we work to help develop and enhance the skill of really focus on creatively developing an understanding of intersectional worldviews.

Our our practitioners incorporate an anti racist and an anti oppressive perspective into their work. They focus on learning approaches to challenging structures and systems that oppress and marginalized. And our graduates advocate for social justice in policies and services.

To uphold human rights. So that's our purpose, it's our aim, it's our focus, that's what we are.

Working towards as we work and and deliver our program and our curriculum amongst our students. Now that's kind of broad strokes what we do, but in terms of the program specifically and how we operate, let me take a few minutes just to talk with you about some of those details. One of the first things I want to highlight about our program and how it operates is that we utilize what's known as a cohort model.

So if you are admitted to our program, you're going to find that you begin with a cohort or a group of other students and you progress through the program together, OK? So it helps to really build camaraderie and teamwork as you move throughout the program and all of the different course requirements. This is a little different from other programs that may allow you to kind of choose your courses and when you want to take them.

Our program also has small class sizes on average. In the classes that I teach, I'll typically have.

Somewhere between 15 and 20 students, sometimes a couple more, sometimes a couple less, but that's the average class size. We really pride ourselves on having smaller class sizes in the graduate program to ensure that you get a lot of face to face interaction with your instructors. Alright, in terms of our curriculum, we offer a set of core courses that all students are expected to take.

These courses relate to social work practice.

We have courses in social advocacy, social justice, and social welfare policy. There are courses in social work research, and we have courses that focus in on diversity and functioning as a culturally competent and as a culturally humble practitioner. In addition to those core courses, students are able to take 3 electives as they move throughout our program. So.

Got some flexibility in choosing a couple of courses that are going to be specific to your area of interest and the type of work that you'll be doing as a social worker. And a number of those are going to be more clinical in focus. I'll come back to some of the details of that in just a few minutes, though. One of the last things I want to highlight about our program and how it functions is that we have a very strong practicum component. And again, this is how some other professors or other professions will sometimes refer to this.

As an internship.

Practicum is considered to be the signature pedagogy of social work. OK. The reason for that is because we are not just a profession that focuses in on building your head knowledge. We really want to help focus on developing your skill set. So everybody who goes through our program will be expected to complete 900 hours of practicum placement field hours. OK, so.

Working in the field.

At a specific agency, under the supervision of a practicum supervisor, delivering services in the real world with actual clients. This is something that's actually required of our accrediting body.

But that you'll be expected to do and basically what it equates to is about two days out of the week will be dedicated full time to working in a practical placement. Now when you get admitted to the program, if and when you're admitted to the program.

You'll be contacted by our practicum coordinator and that individual will work with you to try and assess what your areas of practice interest are, where you live and all those sort of things to try and identify a practicum placement that would be the best fit for you.

Umm, you're not expected to come in with your own practical placements. That's something that we will work to help provide for you. OK, so that's a little bit about our practical placements, the expectations and what that will look like as you move through our program. And again, another thing I want to highlight is that we have a very strong link between our core courses, which you learn in class and what you're doing at the practicum site. So you're going to find a lot of our course activities.

Have overlapped with what you're doing at your practical placement. Our program, UMM is accredited through the Council on Social Work Education. This is a nationally recognized accrediting body. UMM. It really is the only accrediting body for social work programs within the United States. But what this means is that because we are accredited, you will be able to go up for your license after you graduate.

So it really is quite important and we make sure that all of our curriculum and the way in which we function as a program are in compliance with the standards of that accrediting body.

Now I talk to you a little bit about the purpose and the aim of our program. Something else I want to make sure to highlight for you is that we do have a practice specialization. Our accrediting body requires every program to have a practice specialization. Ours is in congruence with our purpose and our aim, and this practice specialization focuses on preparing students to work with marginalized populations using a social justice lens.

So everything that you heard about social justice and advocacy in our purpose and aims comes through in the practice specialization. Basically what this means is that during the second-half of our program, what what we term to be the specialized practice here, all of our courses are going to have this strong focus on social justice. So regardless of whether you're taking a course on social justice and advocacy or whether you're taking a course in practice or research or diversity.

All of those courses are going to have this very strong focus on social justice. It's going to be interweaved throughout that course content.

Now in addition to this practice specialization that all students participate in, I mentioned before that students have the ability to take electives with us. We have had a number of students with an an increased interest in clinical social work over the last couple years. So one of the things that we've done is we've developed an elective track in clinical social work. We have a variety of different electives that focus in on issues such as.

As trauma informed social work practice, we have courses in cognitive behavioral courses in suicidal suicidology.

So a wide variety of different clinical social work classes and if you choose to take all three of your electives in clinical social work, then you will have completed our elective track. But I also want to make sure to mention that it's not just in our elective courses where clinical course content is taught, it's also in some of our.

Core courses, So again, you'll have more than enough coursework hours to be able to go up for the LCSW if you complete your degree with us.

Now.

One other major component of our program that I want to make sure to highlight for you and talk about are some of the program options that are available. So first thing I want to highlight is that we do have what's known as an advanced standing program.

Advanced standing means that you would be able to complete our program with half as many credit hours, so you just have to complete the second-half of our program.

Advanced standing is something that's only available to individuals who have completed their undergraduate degree in social work at ACSWE accredited institution. So if you've done a bachelor's degree in social work at an accredited institution, you can apply for the Advanced Standing program and complete our program in half the time.

OK. For individuals who do advance standing with us on a full time basis, you can complete the degree in just one year. If you choose to enroll in the advanced standing program as a part time student, you can do it in two years, okay, but essentially it cuts the degree work down in half for you.

For those who have not completed their undergraduate degree in social work at an accredited institution, you would apply under the traditional format to complete both the generalist as well as the specialized content in our program. If we have a variety of students who complete the program with us who come from other fields such as criminal justice, psychology, sociology.

We've even had students who have done undergraduate degrees in math and journalism and those kind of things.

And you are eligible to apply, but you would need to complete the full program. You can do the full program either in on a full time basis or on a part time basis. Full time takes two years, part time would be 3 years. Now as we consider some of these full time versus part time options, I also want to make sure just to highlight that going through our program on a full time basis is like doing a full time job, OK.

One of the things.

About this is that it's it's something that takes a lot of work in terms of prep for class, doing your papers and everything else. So if you are currently in full time employment and want to take classes with us on a full time basis, you may want to reassess and just consider how you're going to juggle all of that work. And for some of you, our part time option might be a great option that allows you to continue working while you study. OK, so just something to consider.

As you apply to the program.

Now this next slide is just a bit of a recap. I want to talk just briefly and identify some of the highlights of our program. I know Stockton isn't your only choice for an MSW degree, but I think we have a great program and here are some of the features that that make us stand out. So First off, why Stockton? Well, I've emphasized before that we have smaller class sizes, which gives you this direct interaction with faculty members, umm and opportunities for some more of that hands on learning under the guidance and mentoring.

Of our faculty, we utilize a cohort model. This is another important feature which helps to build teamwork. Something I haven't highlighted is that we have competitive tuition costs when compared to other MSW programs in New Jersey. We have a supportive and esteemed group of faculty who will help provide some of that mentoring that I talked about before. We have full time as well as part time options. So for those of you who are working professionals.

The part time option could be a great way to open up the doors to complete this advanced degree.

And then finally, we have strong linkage to the community in Atlantic City, which helps to keep us connected and keep us involved in the communities where we're doing practicum, where social workers operate, and gives great opportunities for students to do volunteer work as well, which we'll talk about in just a few minutes.

So next, what I'd like to do is, umm, turn the platform over to my colleague from graduate, umm, the Office of Graduate Admissions. Jen's gonna talk with us a little bit about the admissions process itself, umm, and what that'll look like for you.

Yes. So you've heard a lot of the great things about why you should come to Stockton for the MSW program. Let's figure out how we make that happen. Umm, so there are a number of requirements that we would need you to complete in order to do the admission process. The application for this fall is currently still open. Umm, so we, uh, enroll once a year. So currently we are enrolling for the start of the fall 2025 term.

And the application deadline is March 14th.

So you do have a little bit over a month to get your application complete and there's a number of components that you'll need to have in order to make that process happen. So first of all, as we mentioned, you do need to have a bachelor's degree. Those who are wishing to do the advanced standing program, you do need to have a BSW from an accredited institution. And also note that that BSW has to have been completed within the last 10 years. So if you have a degree that is older than 10 years, unfortunately you would still need to do the general track for.

Program UMM For a completed application, there are a number of essays that are involved. Those essays will populate once you start your application. They can change from year to year and they are different for all of our programs. And so for this one in particular, once you start your application, you'll be able to view those particular essays. We encourage for your essays that you, umm are not using any kind of AI to write those essays. They these are your own words. However, we do encourage you to have someone take a look over them.

Umm, for spelling and grammatical errors, typos, things like that.

But this does need to be written by you and we do encourage you looking over it multiple times to make sure that they are are as best as they can be, putting your best foot forward. You will also need to have a cumulative GPA of a 3.0. So we will require that transcripts from every institution that you've attended are loaded to your application. You have to have those sent to us from the schools you attended. They'll send them to us and we will load those for you. But if you have.

Any coursework from any institution, graduate or bachelor's degree.

Umm, even if you did not complete your degree at that institution, let's say for example, you went to umm, uh, Community College and you took a number of classes before transferring to a four year institution, we would need the transcripts from the Community College as well as the one where you completed your four year degree, your umm, uh, bachelor's degree. So please make sure that you send those to us. If you happen to have another masters degree, for instance, we would need to have those transcripts as well. So everything gets sent to us and we will load those for you.

And your cumulative GPA of all of those institutions needs to be above a 3.0. Next, uh, when you start your application, it will ask you to input uh, individuals that you would like to be recommenders for you. You will need 3 letters of recommendation. One of those should be umm, if you're applying for the advanced standing. One of those needs to be a letter from a practicum supervisor, umm, or social work supervisor, please. So please take note of that umm, but any of your other recommendations, these should be individuals who can speak to your.

Success, they should be people who either you've had as a professor in a class before have supervised you in a social work type setting or in a leadership type setting. So again, that they can speak to how you will excel in the classroom and the field of social work. So even though you have a next door neighbor that you've known for 20 or 30 years and they can speak to your personality or your work ethic, we, we do want you to steer clear of any personal.

Recommenders So no family, no friends. These need to be professional in nature.

And specifically academic in nature if possible, as well as anyone who's again, supervised you in the field if you have that experience.

Uh, what you will do is you will input their name, their e-mail address, and their title, and our electronic online application process will send them the forms they need to complete in order to, umm, uh, do your recommendation. We suggest you reach out to them ahead of time before putting their name on the application to let them know that you're going to be listing them.

So that they can agree to that, please indicate to them the deadlines. If you do not have your materials in by the deadline that was stated of March 14th, you see here, then your application may not be reviewed. And we will try to, you'll get automated responses knowing if they have done, they've completed their letters of recommendation. You'll be able to see it on your application checklist. But it is important to let them know ahead of time that they will need this, that they agree to it, and that the deadline of March 14th is very, very important.

Umm, so if you have any questions about that specifically, you can definitely reach out to that to us and we'd be able to help. The last thing is, uh, a copy of your most up-to-date resume and you'll upload that in APDF format and, uh, that will be part of the application process as well. So those are kind of the main components of the things that you would need. And so, uh, we would like to tell you a little bit more about the program and what some of our students are doing. So Doctor Barney, would you like to tell a little bit more?

Absolutely. So you've got to hear a whole lot for me about my perspective of the program. But one of the things I want to share with you are some of the details about our students themselves. So First off, in terms of our alumni, we have graduated over 500 MSW professionals from our program since we started in 2009. And our alumni work in a variety of different settings in the local community across New Jersey, across New Jersey, and even in other states.

And actually, some of our alumni now serve as practicum supervisors for current students, which is great, and it's a great opportunity for them to give back. What I want to do next is show you just a short clip that gives you some testimonials where you get to hear directly from some of our past graduates. People have gone through the program about their perceptions of the program.

And some of the highlights for them about what it is that we do.

The one thing that I will share with you just briefly is that a lot of these alumni are speaking about our past. Really it's our current practice specialization, which is diversity focus. But recently we've made a move towards this social justice focus, which will be slightly different for some of you who are coming into this new curriculum.

All right, so again, just some of the perspectives of our graduates, uh, people who have gone through our program. Umm, the last umm, bit of information I want to give you before we open this up to our question and answer portion of the discussion. It's just a little bit about the MSW Alliance, which is our student club in the MSW program. Umm, the alliance, umm, has engaged in a variety of different opportunities that do a lot of volunteer work and outreach in the local.

Some of this has involved things such as a suicide prevention and awareness walk. They've engaged in Halloween candy drives for local organizations such as the Covenant House, which is a youth shelter in the local community. They've done holiday toy drives, and they'll also provide support and assistance for additional resources around things like licensing test prep.

And even this year we have the student club who are getting engaged in a policy advocacy day.

Where we'll we'll be able to take a trip into Washington to interact with legislators. OK, so that is a little bit about the student club and opportunities that you'll be able to get involved in as a student beyond just the classroom.

Awesome, thank you so much. Umm, I know that we have, we already have a ton of questions in the chat, so we're gonna dive right in. Umm, as we had mentioned, we were gonna save those till the end 'cause I think some of them we actually answered throughout our presentation. We can re reiterate those answers for you. Umm, but we'll go ahead and jump in. Umm So the first question, do you happen to have a percentage of the LCSW received at Stockton?

I don't, umm, it's not something that I'm, I'm aware of that I, I know. I'm not even sure how I would get that record. Umm, so for LCSW, I'm not sure.

Umm, next question I believe we answer, but we can tap into it one more time. How long does it take to complete an MSW at Stockton?

Yeah. So for this one, it really depends on how you move through the program. If you're an advanced standing student and you go through full time, you can do it in just one year, OK. But if you're at advanced standing and you go through on a part time basis, it takes two years. Now, if you come in and you have to complete the traditional program on a full time basis, that takes two years. But if you do it on a part time basis, then it's three years.

Excellent, thank you. Umm, so the next question was about financial aid for international students. And I'm glad this was brought up because one thing that I did forget to mention when we were covering the admission process is that for our international applicants, there are a few more steps that you do have to take for this process. Umm, we do have to not only receive your transcripts from the insurance, you know, the official transcripts from the institutions you attended, but also a transcript evaluation from either UMM, Wes, EC or Spantran umm. So please keep that in mind. And then there are a few other documents I would.

You, I'm gonna, in a few moments, I'm gonna drop the MSW website into the chat for everyone to have because everything that we're talking about is on that site. So you can refer back to that. We will also be including a copy of the webinar there too. So if you wanna go back and watch it again, you can, but you'll have your checklist of prerequisite materials and your items that you'll have to do. And then I'll also drop in the chat a link to our international application information, which all the still the same things apply, but there are just a few more little items that you'll have to do.

Like I said, like the, uh, transcript evaluation as far as financial aid, umm, I'm gonna talk kind of broadly about this for all of our students. Umm, that is an entire other session. We actually have that coming up later this semester. So we encourage you to register for that webinar too. We'll spend an entire hour to talk about how to finance your graduate education. Umm, but in particular, we do have graduate assistantships. We do have small scholarships and you can apply for financial aid if you are a domestic student. We don't have the opportunity for.

Financial aid unfortunately, but again, I encourage you to tune in for that session with our financial aid department, which I believe is going to be in April and you can go to our upcoming events tab and I can drop that in our chat as well. So great, great question. But for financial aid baseline, just to let you know, it is not the same as undergrad. There are not sadly, not as many opportunities.

But there are opportunities to to provide private loans and that can make a huge difference.

As well as some of the small scholarships that Stockton offers as well. If you're a current Stockton student and currently enrolled this spring and you are applying for this upcoming fall, you can also apply for the foundation scholarship process, which is opening, I think actually maybe open right now or if not, it's opening next week. And so again, we would encourage any current Stockton students to apply for that. If your time is, there's not going to be a time lapse in between you're registered this semester and then you are applying for this upcoming fall as.

Well, so great question.

We had another question about someone who has a bachelor's, Bachelor of Social Work from more than 15 years ago. Unfortunately, you would still have to do that general program track. You would not be eligible for the advanced standing track as we mentioned. So good question.

And then someone had asked about the difference between the the advanced standing and and the general track. Again, you must have that bachelor's degree that we talked about.

Uh, another.

And Lily also just highlight very briefly the generalist is our traditional program. So those two are the same. The one that's different from it is advanced standing.

Correct. Thank you. Yes, very helpful. Yes.

Someone asked if they're graduating this May, can they still apply for the fall term? Yes, 110% yes. So what happens is we have something called a conditional acceptance. So you would give us everything that you've done up until December as far as your transcripts. You submit all your other material and then we will request additional material from you if you happen to be accepted after you've your degree has been conferred. So it's an acceptance where it says yes, you meet all the requirements. We'd love to have you, but we know you still have one more.

Left so you make sure you do well on that because if you do not do well, it can have an effect. But then you, we have proof of conferral of your degree and, and umm, we can go from there. So great question and you should apply because yes, umm, you're not going to be finished this May and the application process will be umm, the deadline is before your commencement date.

Umm, next, uh, so this is also a really good question. Umm, someone said I know you said, uh, that the application is open once a year, but is there any way to offer admission for spring of?

In, in a spring semester. So I will share with you that you do have the ability to apply as a non matriculated student and, but I have to also share with you some of the pluses and minuses of doing that. So, umm, number one for a non matriculated student, uh, this means that you are not fully enrolled in the program, but if there are seats available that you would be eligible to, to take one of those courses that spring.

Umm, there is some risk involved with that first being.

The financial risk so you are not eligible for any kind of aid or scholarships if you are a non matriculated student. So you'll be paying the full price for that course out of pocket. And so that that's the first part of it. The second part, it does not guarantee that even if you do well in that course that you would be admitted. However, if you do well in that course, it can also help to boost your application as well because that credit and that grade would be.

Part of your application process for that following fall.

Umm, the last part being all matriculated students get to register first. If we have a substantial amount of people in the cohorts at that time and all classes are full, it may not be a guarantee that you would be able to get into that class. So know that the non matriculation process is available. Umm, but again, there is some risk associated with that. Umm Rob, is there anything else you might want to add as part of that? And I get all of those components for that one.

No, I think you covered it. Yeah. So it's only admission once per year for the fall, but you can take courses with us as an Omnitrix.

Yeah, umm, next question. If we have a placement in mind for practicum, can they pick their own practicum placement site?

Great question.

Yes and no. It is possible to make a suggestion for a practicum placement, but you'll have to make sure to work with the practical coordinator on that just to make sure that we are fully in compliance with our accrediting body. They're going to want to make sure that we have an affiliation agreement that's set up with the organization. If there isn't 1, then they'll work on completing that. They're also going to want to make sure that we have a supervisor for you at that agency.

Who is able to supervise and meets all of the criteria?

And finally, they're going to want to make sure that.

Your work or the work that you're going to be doing will cover all of the required competencies of our accrediting body. So it is something that's possible. It's not guaranteed, but you can certainly speak with our practicum coordinator about that option. And I can actually add our practicum coordinators contact information in the chat as well, if you'd like to reach out to him directly.

Great. Umm, so the next question is if I turn in my application or complete my application before the deadline, will I get a decision quickly? Umm, so our traditional turn around is four to six weeks. And so, uh, for this program, applications are being reviewed. So it is, it does behoove you to get your application complete, uh, you know, as soon as possible. Umm, it also relieves some stress on your end to know that it is complete. Don't rush in. Make sure everything is, you know, all the eyes are.

The TS across that's really important, but we do encourage you to get that in as soon as possible. That would be important for those who do not have a bachelor's degree in social work. Is the time frame and application process the same? Yes, it is. Keep it simple. Umm, do you provide financial aid for students in state and out of state? We do have, as I had mentioned, we have the opportunities for graduate assistantships. We have some small scholarships available. Umm, and then we do provide you can.

Uh, do the FAFSA form through financial aid to apply for private loans and that's for, we don't have any difference between in or out of state, umm, as far as that's concerned. So that would be eligible for, for all students to apply for.

Umm can you tell us what the classes typical start time is? Umm or days of the week? Umm and specifically for the part time for the two years?

Yeah, uh, great question. So currently our courses are held on Monday, Wednesday nights and on Saturdays. The Monday, Wednesday nights, uh, currently begin at 6:00 and on Saturdays classes begin at 8:15 in the morning. We are making a shift to change some of that. Umm, so there are moves, umm, that that are being made, umm, to have courses on weeknights, umm, and I believe that the proposal would be for courses.

Begin around 4:30 in the afternoon to get away from some of those Saturday classes. So just weeknights and no Saturdays is what's being intended for the future.

And to follow up on that, there was a question as if there was any, uh, full time online option. Umm, And the answer to that is unfortunately no. This is, it is important for programs such as these to be in person due to the nature of what you're learning. And so it's been intentionally structured in that way. Umm, but Doctor Barney, anything else you would want to add on that note too?

No, umm, part of the move is going to be umm, not just to have our classes on weeknights, but to further incorporate hybrid UMM learning opportunities there. So a little bit less face to FaceTime and some online content, but we are still considered to be UMM, you know, face to face in many regards. You'll still have face to face course requirements.

And then our final question, it looks like is there was a question, you know, if they received a bachelors degree in psychology, would they be they would not be advanced standing. So that is correct. You would need to be doing the generalist track if you have a psychology degree. It would only be if you have a BSW from an accredited institution for the advanced standing. So, so really great questions. Someone also asked about an application fee waiver. We have a domestic application fee waiver if you would like to e-mail us.

We can help you with that for more details. It all depends on, you know, the year that you're applying and the program and such. So please feel free to reach out to grad school at stockton.edu For more information about that question.

And the next question was specific to public administration. Basically you can, it does not matter what bachelor's degree you do hold, you are eligible to apply for the generalist program. So we would encourage you to to, to do so.

Umm.

Thank you. Yup.

Yes, great point.

Yes.

Something I can add about that is our accrediting body does require that you have some background in the liberal arts. So that's something that we'll look at and it's usually not an issue for students unless you've done something so specialized that you've not gotten some of that liberal arts component. Aside from that, anybody's able to take courses with us and completely MSW.

Perfect. All right, well, I thank all of you for attending our session today. I hope that you have found it helpful. You learned a little bit more about the program and it really encourages you to apply. If you have already started your application, I hope it gives you the final pieces you need to complete your application. However, after you've gone through all of this and your, umm, you know, doing all of your research, if you have additional questions, I would encourage you to reach out to us. We are more than happy to assist. We would love to answer your questions and we're here for you through this process.

We know that it can be difficult, it can be cumbersome, and we want to see you be successful through that process. So please don't hesitate to reach out with any additional questions that you have. And we hope that you all have a wonderful day. Thank you so much, everyone. Take care.

Thank you all.