Whether you intend to work internationally or in the United States, the Global Social Work Certificate will help you understand global connections and perspectives. Through a series of courses, specialized monthly in-service experiences, and internship projects, you’ll gain the skills and knowledge needed to work cross-culturally, either at home or abroad.
You’ll complete this certificate concurrently with your Denver Campus MSW program. The certificate is open to Denver Campus MSW students. The featured courses below are a few of the course options available in the Global Social Work curriculum. To enhance course content and internship experiences, you’ll participate in Let’s Go Global, a series of quarterly trainings and activities related to international social work.
Want to learn more about the Global Social Work Certificate?
Denver Campus Info Sessions
Learning Outcomes
Global social work courses are anchored in social work values and ethics and apply a power, privilege and oppression framework to human rights advocacy and intervention. Through the Global Social Work Certificate, you will
- Further your understanding of relationship-based work done in conjunction with local communities—working side by side rather than top-down
- Explore appropriate roles for working internationally
- Weigh ethical considerations when working in a community other than one’s own
- Examine injustices and inequalities in the context of domestic and international policies and agreements
- Reflect on the need to avoid the “white savior complex”
- Learn to approach international social work from a place of humility and decenter your own lens
Your Career Options
By completing the Global Social Work Certificate, you’ll graduate with an additional professional credential and a competitive advantage in your job search. Your international social work career could include:
- Working on issues connected to refugees both domestically and internationally with organizations such as the Red Cross, refugee resettlement programs and schools
- Human rights advocacy at the international, national and local level
- Working with nongovernmental organizations and local, regional and national governments on sustainable development projects connected to human security such as food justice and economic safety
- Working on projects connected to economic development locally, nationally and internationally
- Working on universal issues such as HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and lasting COVID-19 impact
Featured Courses
SOWK 4759
Global Cultural Perspectives: Ethical Considerations
About this Course
Examine the values and ethics of social work practice in a global context of power, privilege and oppression and develop practice skills to enhance the health, well-being and sustainability of communities. Through case studies, critical thinking, cultural inventories and reflexivity, this course will challenge you to examine ethical and value-based conundrums when practicing in global settings.
SOWK 4765
Global Social Change
About this Course
With a focus on global issue policy design, this course provides an introduction to the history of international social development and current needs for a shift in human priorities toward regenerative development. You’ll grow your knowledge of policymaking for global human security and the practice skills required for local social development.
SOWK 4990-1
Global Trauma
About this Course
Examine the ways in which people collectively experience traumatic events such as terrorism, sexual violence, refugee camps, food scarcity and war and the role of social work in prevention, advocacy and intervention. You’ll explore the role of international and national policies and communities in causing situations that result in collective trauma as well as their response to it.
Global Social Work Certificate Coordinator
Ann T. Petrila
Professor of the Practice, Coordinator of Global Initiatives, Director of Global Practice Bosnia
Learn More
Related Stories
Social Work and Mutual Aid
A GSSW research team is studying the ways that mutual aid has been meeting Colorado community needs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Practicing Advocacy at the U.N.
As a UN Practicum in Advocacy fellow, MSW student Ozy Aloziem got a crash course in international policymaking and advocacy as a delegate to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.
Exploring Impacts of Voluntourism
With an MSW pathway in sustainable development and global practice, recent graduate Marissa Messinger is driven to find ethical ways to practice international social work.
Application Information
Final Application Deadline: Winter 2025 Denver Campus MSW Program
