Unlike majors such as psychology or sociology, the BSW major is a professional program, more like nursing or education. This requires that students are able to possess personal responsibility and maturity to be able to demonstrate professional behavior. This includes behaviors like attending class regularly and on time, showing respect for other students and faculty as well as actively participating in activities both during class and outside of class. The major uses many forms of experiential learning such as service-learning, agency volunteer work and student conferences, which are expected as part of classroom assignments.

Social work is a values-based profession, and we suggest that prospective students visit the website of the National Association of Social Workers to read the Code of Ethics (https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics/Code-of-Ethics). It is important for students to determine that their personal values are well-aligned with those of the social work profession.

The BSW program requires many pre-requisite courses for the upper level classes in the major. These include: introduction to psychology; developmental psychology; introduction to sociology; American government; statistics; and a course on race/ethnicity/cultural diversity. In order for a student to complete the BSW major in four semesters, at least three of these pre-requisites must be completed before matriculating at JMU. The others may be taken in the first semester at JMU. For more information, please visit the Social Work department website and click on Information for Transfer Students.

• Create a schedule for all required courses, pay attention to prerequisites and when courses are offered, complete your first math and English courses in your first year
• Connect with an advisor at your community college and James Madison University within your first year via College Connect

For students who transfer with an associate degree and plan to graduate in four semesters, the BSW curriculum is very demanding and there are few opportunities to take classes outside the major. There really are few opportunities to add a minor; however, there is an option to take courses in the minors that are housed in the social work department - Family Studies and Nonprofit Studies - as they are often co-listed as social work elective courses.

All BSW majors complete a 472-hour field experience during their final semester at JMU. This involves being placed in a social, health or human services agency for four days per week, usually Monday through Thursday, 8am to 5pm, or whatever the hours of the agency are. Students are under the supervision of an agency-based social worker as well as a faculty liaison from the department, and they are actively involved in practicing social work. Many students have been employed by those agencies upon graduation.

Students who graduate with their BSW degree are eligible to apply for Advanced Standing in MSW programs around the nation. This means that instead of the usual two-year Masters program, BSWs are able to complete their MSW program in one calendar year.

BSW graduates from JMU regularly received Advanced Standing admission from premier MSW programs such as Rutgers University, the University of Maryland, the University of South Carolina and Virginia Commonwealth University. They have also been successful in gaining admission to other graduate programs including law school, urban planning and counseling.

Our graduates regularly report being extremely well-prepared for their graduate education and find their graduate classes to be on par with the expectations of our BSW program.

Many students choose to gain valuable experience prior to going to graduate school and have been accepted into programs such as City Year, the Lutheran Service Corp, Teach for America and the Peace Corps.

• Completing your Associate transfer degree post-high school satisfies all lower division general education requirements and increases the chance of completing your bachelor's degree?
• Exceeding 3 years or 90 credits at your community college means you may have exhausted your financial aid at that college and have limited your future financial aid at: James Madison University