Social Work field directors are increasingly dealing with ethical and practical issues related to the use of social and digital media in field education. This workshop will provide information and tools to help field directors raise awareness with students and field supervisors.

1. A Toolkit for Social and
Digital Media Policies
in Field Education
Allison M. Curington (@amcuring)
Laurel Iverson Hitchcock (@laurelhitchcock)

2. • Demonstrate an understanding of FERPA, HIPPA, and
other policies and standards that can guide their
development of their own professional policy and
begin to create programmatic best practice around
the use of social media.
• Develop their own professional social media policy.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this presentation, participants
will be able to:
• Create activities for students in field that
include social and digital media.

3. Social Media = forms of
electronic communication
Digital Media = digitized
content
Mobile Devices
What are Digital & Social Media?

4. • Most adults in US use social media, but varies by age
and gender
• Graduate students, health professionals and helping
practitioners are engaged users of social media
• Child welfare workers using social media with clients
without informing supervisors (Sage & Sage, 2015)
• Personal use of social media among students doesn’t
translate to e-professionalism (Karpman & Drisko,
2016)
• CSWE 2015 EPAS - “Social workers understand
emerging forms of technology and the ethical use of
technology in social work practice.”
Who is using social media in social work and how?

5. What are social media policies?
Social Media Policies/Guidelines
 Outlines a Code of Conduct
 Discusses Best Practices
 Makes Recommendations

6. Policies that influence social media use in SWK Education
HIPAA & FERPA
HIPAA
 Provides data privacy and security provisions for safeguarding
medical information
Common examples of violations in relation to social networks:
• Posting about a patient to unauthorized individuals even if the name
is not disclosed
• Sharing photographs or any PHI without written consent from
patient
• A mistaken belief that posts are private or have been deleted when
they are still visible to the public
• Sharing of seemingly innocent comments or pictures, such as a
workplace lunch which happen to have visible files underneath

7. Policies that influence social media use in SWK Education
HIPAA & FERPA
FERPA
 Gives students access to their education records
 Allows students to have an opportunity to have the
records amended
 Allows some control over the disclosure of
information from the records
Scenario:
A student creates and posts a blog to fulfill a field
assignment. Could this blog ever be considered an
educational record?
What if the faculty liaison publically comments on the
student’s blog post? Is this protected by FERPA?

8. How to write your own Social Media Policy
Why you need a
professional social
media policy?

9. Allison’s Social Media Policy
In considering the salient points in this document I relied on
the following resources to guide me:
NASW Code of the Ethics
NASW & ASWB Standards for Technology and Social Work
Practice
UA Social Media Guidelines
Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)
• Privacy and confidentiality
• Boundaries
• Friending
• Use of Search Engines
• E-mail
Full policy available at: http://www.laureliversonhitchcock.org/2016/02/12/my-guidelines-for-using-digital-social-tech-
in-the-classroom-and-beyond/

10. Laurel’s Social Media Policy
My policy addresses the following ethical concerns:
• Maintain and model virtual boundaries
• Keep information and content private and confidential
• Promote integrity and accountability
• Be accessible and model professional digital
communication
Here are some course and classroom specific guidelines for
students:
• What is okay in the classroom?
• What is not okay in the classroom?
• What is the best way to use email as part of this course?
• What is the best way to use text messages as part of this
course?
Full policy available at: http://www.laureliversonhitchcock.org/2016/02/12/my-guidelines-for-using-digital-social-tech-
in-the-classroom-and-beyond/

11. How to write your own Social Media Policy
Social Media Policy Checklist and Worksheet for
Social Workers
Guidelines
1. What sources or standards do you need to consider?
2. Who are you informing with your policy?
3. What ethical concerns does your policy need to address?
4. How do you want to engage in common online activities?
Practice
Social Media Policy Checklist and Worksheet for Social
Workers

12. Sample Assignment from Technology-Based
Learning Task List for Social Work Education:
1. Locate and review policies and regulations that
oversee the use of digital technology at one’s
practicum agency or learning institution.
2. Write a personal digital and social technology
policy that reflects your professional use of
social & digital technologies in social work
practice .
Example Assignments for Field
Hitchcock, L.I., Sage, M., & Smyth, N.J. (2016). Technology-Based Learning
Task List for Social Work Education (Version 1.1 – 6/13/16). Retrieved from:
http://www.laureliversonhitchcock.org/2016/06/13/revised-technology-
based-learning-task-list-for-social-work-education/

13. Social Media Toolkit for
Social Work Field Educators

14. About the Social Media Toolkit for Social
Work Field Educators.
Reflection
Assignment
Case Study
Information
The purpose of this toolkit is to
provide social work field educators
with the tools and resources to help
students assess, develop, and
maintain an online identity for
professional purposes.
Please refer to the different icons
throughout this toolkit to help you
identify different types of
information.

15. Please sign our email list to receive notification about the release
of the Social Media Toolkit for Social Work Field Educators:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SOMEToolkit_Field
Allison M. Curington, LCSW
Director of Field Education
University of Alabama
amcurington@sw.ua.edu
@amcuring
Laurel Iverson Hitchcock , PhD, LCSW
Assistant Professor
University of Alabama at Birmingham
(UAB)
lihitch@uab.edu
@laurelhitchcock
Questions and Comments

16. References
Hitchcock, L.I., & Curington, A. (2016). My Guidelines for using Digital & Social Tech in
the Classroom and Beyond. Retrieved from:
http://www.laureliversonhitchcock.org/2016/02/12/my-guidelines-for-using-
digital-social-tech-in-the-classroom-and-beyond/
Hitchcock, L.I., Sage, M., & Smyth, N.J. (2016). Technology-Based Learning Task List for
Social Work Education (Version 1.1 – 6/13/16). Retrieved from:
http://www.laureliversonhitchcock.org/2016/06/13/revised-technology-based-
learning-task-list-for-social-work-education/
Karpman, H. E., & Drisko, J. (2016). Social Media Policy in Social Work Education: A
Review and Recommendations. Journal of Social Work Education, 0(0), 1–11.
https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2016.1202164
Sage, M., & Sage, T. (2016). Social Media and E-professionalism in Child Welfare: Policy
and Practice. Journal of Public Child Welfare, 10(1), 79–95.
https://doi.org/10.1080/15548732.2015.1099589