Make the world a better place and find your education purposeful and rewarding. Learn how to work as a partner on behalf of our vulnerable citizens through individual and social advocacy. Understand the social welfare systems and the challenges people face through first-hand experience.
Loras provides a supportive learning community that nurtures competent, ethical, value-based social work practitioners in service to others in a variety of settings, including hospitals, schools, government agencies, community organizations, and private practice.
Accreditation
The Loras Social Work program is certified by both academic and social work accrediting agencies. In accordance with the requirements of CSWE’s recognition body, the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA), the CSWE Office of Social Work Accreditation (OSWA) administers a multistep accreditation process that involves program self-studies, site visits, and COA reviews.
Program Mission
The Loras Social Work program is a supportive learning community that graduates value-based, generalist practitioners who promote human and community well-being. Students, grounded in the liberal arts, empowerment, and person-in-environment frameworks, are guided by the values of the social work profession.
Working with and in partnering agencies, students actively learn knowledge, social work values (service, social justice, dignity and worth of the human person, importance of human relationships, integrity, competence, human rights), and skills based on scientific inquiry; identify and challenge systems that perpetuate social, racial, economic, and environmental injustice.
Students adopt respect for human diversity, adhere to ethical guidelines that inform their work with diverse populations, and contribute responsibly to all people locally and globally.
What can you do?
After receiving your degree from Loras, you could move on to graduate school or a variety of careers:
- Foster Care & Adoption
- Probation Officer
- Child Abuse Investigator
- Domestic Violence Advocate
- Hospital Social Worker
- Nursing Home/Hospice
- Mental Health Worker
- Residential Home Counselor
- Human Rights Advocate
- Refugee Resettlement Worker
- Community Organizer
- Graduate school
Senior social work students complete 420 hours of actual social work practice in a social service agency. The following are some of the agencies providing field instruction experience for social work students:
- Health and Human Services Department
- Families First Counseling
- Dept of Correctional Services
- Hillcrest Family Services
- Mercy Medical Center/Unity Point Hospital
- Multicultural Family Center
- United Way
- Lutheran Services of Iowa
- Stonehill Care Center
- Four Oaks Family and Children Services
- Riverview Sexual Assault Program
Course Highlights
School of Science & Health
Majors & Minors
Experiential Learning
Each spring, social work majors travel to the state capitol to engage in lobbying for chosen legislative interests. The social work program has a partnership with India. Students study away for a semester in Chennai, taking classes, completing an internship, and traveling.
Clubs & Orgs
We have a variety of opportunities for you to get involved from the moment you set foot on campus.
Social Work Council
Civic Leaders
The Alliance
O-Ver
Peace and Justice Club
Straight Talk from a Duhawk
My social work and psychology classes have opened me up to many new opportunities and experiences. I am constantly learning something new. My professors have true passion for teaching and truly care about me and how I am doing.
— Hillary (’26)
Meet Your Professors
Michelle Bechen LMSW
Professor of Social Work
Amanda Reynolds MSW LISW (’06)
Assistant Professor of Social Work
Nancy Zachar Fett LMSW (’90)
Professor of Social Work
Social Work News
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Discovering Purpose Through a Meaningful Internship
Sydney Davis (’25), a social work major, has found her passion through an internship at The Lantern Center. Working with immigrants and refugees from diverse… More
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Real Talk and Real Growth at the Fountain of Youth
August Witt (’26), a Loras student from Decorah, IA, is making the most of his internship at the Fountain of Youth. There, he facilitates ‘Real Talk’ groups… More
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IPTC Grant to Benefit Community College Transfers to Iowa Private Colleges, Universities
Find a more transparent, cost-effective, and coordinated transfer process thanks to a three-year grant More
Social Work with Groups and Families
This is the first course in a sequence of three generalist practice courses. This course addresses practice with families and small groups and focuses on introductory skills needed to facilitate groups. The focus is on group work which entails the deliberate use of intervention strategies and group processes to accomplish individual, group and community goals, using the value base and ethical practice principles of the social work profession.