Strategies for Teaching About Trauma to Graduate Social Work Students

Adverse Childhood Experiences Among Licensed Social Workers

“…The findings of this study point to the need for effective trauma-focused education in social work schools. Given the probability of a large number of students entering programs with a history of ACEs, students need to be taught about vicarious traumatization and be prepared for the possibility of experiencing disturbing thoughts and emotions, as well as difficult somatic responses (Gilin & Kauffman, 2015). Introducing the notion of self-care as an important practice to reduce negative effects of trauma should be part of the curriculum in every school.…”

“…A case study of three social work students with histories of ACEs described the ways in which these experiences may benefit and limit professional training and practice (Zosky, 2013). Gilin and Kauffman (2015) administered the ACE scale to 162 MSW (Master of Social Work) students and Thomas (2016) administered the ACE scale to 79 MSW students, and both found that nearly 80% of their samples had been exposed to at least one ACE. In the latter study, 58.2% of the students had experienced three or more ACEs.…”

Perceived stress and sleep quality among master’s students in social work

“…In summary, previous studies have shown that professional graduate students are likely to have higher levels of perceived stress and poor sleep quality (Myers et al, 2012). Specifically, there is research evidence that having adverse childhood experiences was prevalent in MSW students (Thomas, 2016) and that MSW students with trauma histories had high levels of perceived stress (Gilin & Kauffman, 2015). It has also been documented that clinical social workers, who serve populations with trauma histories, are likely to be exposed to secondary traumatic stress (Bride, 2007;Lee et al, 2018).…”

Troubled times: Canadian social workers’ early adversities, mental health, and resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Since that time period, there has been a renewed interest in researching social workers, with the use of the adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) survey as a framework for understanding childhood adversities and their impact on social work professionals. Most of these studies focus on social work students, probing mental health issues, adversities, and connections to their choice of profession ( Esaki and Larkin, 2013 ; Gilin and Kauffman, 2015 ; Horton et al, 2009 ; Newcomb et al, 2017 ; Olson and Royse, 2006 ; Palomino-Coila and Nunez-Palomino, 2020 ), although a few studies on actively practicing social workers and related helping professionals have been conducted more recently ( Keesler, 2018 ; Stanley et al, 2021 ). Unfortunately, many studies define their target population in varying ways – ‘mental health practitioners’, ‘helping professionals’, ‘support workers’, while some exclusively focus on social workers.…”

“…Studies with social work students have produced interesting results using the ACE framework. Gilin and Kauffman (2015) examined the ACE scores of social work graduate students and compared them with the results from the original ACE study of adult health clinic patients ( Felitti et al, 1998 ). Several items had a considerably higher prevalence for the social work students than the clinic patients including parental separation or divorce (51% vs 23%), having an incarcerated household member (17% vs 5%), and emotional abuse (25% vs 11%).…”