Featured Post

Tips for New Social Work Graduate (MSW) Students

-
Image
  Happy start of the school year! Perusing social media, I came across a NASW blog article called “Guide for the First Year Social Work Student”. This post provided lots of great information tailored for new undergraduate students interested in studying social work. I wanted to take that NASW post a bit farther and compile a list of tips specific to graduate students pursuing a masters in social work (MSW). In my opinion, graduate school is a completely different experience from undergraduate, so my hope is that these tips will serve to be beneficial. Tips for New Social Work Graduate (MSW) Students -Don’t worry about grades so much When I was in graduate school, one of my professors told a story about a straight A student who committed suicide several years after graduation. His point was that given the people we need to work with, we social workers need to focus less on being perfectionists (as demonstrated by obsessing over grades and test scores) and work on being empathetic and co
19 comments

2014: Another New Start

-
It's been a while since my last blog post.  Between work, travel, and general writer's block, I've really haven't written very much lately.  Hence, I really feel like my already mediocre writing skills have diminished even more!  This year, I'm hoping to change that by making alterations that facilitate more frequent posting and allow me more practice in writing.

The first major change is streamlining my blogs.  Looking through my archives, I noticed that I was cross-posting many of my posts to my other blog.  Instead of having two infrequently updated blogs, I figured it would be best to consolidate everything into one blog.  I will still keep Adventures of a (not so) Cheap Social Worker up for now, but all the posts from there can now be found on this site.

Postings on this site will pertain to my job, the social work field, anything remotely social work/healthcare related, money related issues, and my attempts to make the most of a social worker salary.  Like the title of this blog states, I am NOT cheap, but will try (and probably fail) so as to make the most of my money while having the most fun.

I have another infrequently updated blog that documents my daily like and things I like to do for fun, which is to travel.  I think of it as my escape from social work.  I'll probably post a link once I've fixed it up a little.

To end this post, here are my goals for 2014, which I will elaborate on in future posts.  I will keep the list short to increase the likelihood of meeting them all:
1) Blog more frequently
2) Travel more
3) Earn more money that I did last last
4) Spend less than I did last year

Wish me luck!  Happy 2014 everyone!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why I Want To Leave Social Work

-
Image
It's been a while since I've updated this blog. I actually wasn't sure if I would actually come back to it, but given recent events I have some free time on my hands and should keep occupied. With that said, let's cut to the chase. I'm burned out. After 10 years of being a social worker, I'm ready to leave the field. A few of the reasons are as follows:  1) Emotional and physical exhaustion  As we all know, social work is an extremely demanding job with high caseloads, emotionally taxing situations, and strict deadlines. Depending on how busy I am and how much caffeine I've had, I'm usually running on high alert so I could finish everything by the end of my shift and sit in traffic. Being in a continual state of stress has started wearing on me, and I find that as I age I'm not as physically and emotionally resilient as I used to be.   The social work profession promotes self-care as a way to prevent burnout. This is nice and all, but how can you ta
Read more

Tips for New Social Work Graduate (MSW) Students

-
Image
  Happy start of the school year! Perusing social media, I came across a NASW blog article called “Guide for the First Year Social Work Student”. This post provided lots of great information tailored for new undergraduate students interested in studying social work. I wanted to take that NASW post a bit farther and compile a list of tips specific to graduate students pursuing a masters in social work (MSW). In my opinion, graduate school is a completely different experience from undergraduate, so my hope is that these tips will serve to be beneficial. Tips for New Social Work Graduate (MSW) Students -Don’t worry about grades so much When I was in graduate school, one of my professors told a story about a straight A student who committed suicide several years after graduation. His point was that given the people we need to work with, we social workers need to focus less on being perfectionists (as demonstrated by obsessing over grades and test scores) and work on being empathetic and co
Read more

Why Nurses Make More Than Social Workers

-
Image
On social worker blogs and among my peers, I often hear about how unfair it is that nurses get paid more than social workers. A common catchphrase is, "Social workers have twice the education, but half the salary!" A while back, this same issue came up on a social worker salary post on SocialWorkersSpeak.org . I wrote a rather long comment in response and thought it would be good to repost it here. It's my take on this controversial and recurring issue in our field. I can only theorize as to why nurses make more than social workers. While I don’t necessarily agree with everything on this list, here’s what I’ve brainstormed: -Liability: Perhaps nurses are paid more because they directly impact the lives of patients. Injecting the wrong medication dosage, not using proper sanitation methods, and other such mistakes can severely hurt of kill a patient. Furthermore, nurses face many occupational hazards such as direct exposure to diseases, bodily fluids, needlesticks,
Read more