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The University of Windsor’s school of social work planned for its fourth off-campus presence for graduate students.
A new University of Windsor campus was set up in the St. Catharines area to serve masters degree students. The school had 96 post-graduate students enrolled in satellite campuses in Barrie, Peel Region and at the Canadian Mental Health Association office in Windsor.
While Hamilton’s McMaster University offers a masters program in social work, school director Brent Angell said the types of students he’s targeting tend to have work and family commitments, making it difficult for any travel for studies on top of that. Brock University in St. Catharines has no social work program, and while Hamilton may be close, Windsor will soon be closer.
Angell said the demand is coming from employees who want to upgrade their social work credentials and from employers who want their employees to upgrade their skills to move into supervisory and administrative leadership roles.
The expansion comes several years after the U of W did a survey of Ontario’s professional community and discovered a pent-up demand from potential students and employers. The Niagara region was one of the areas expressing a strong interest, said Angell. He cites Peterborough and Kingston as examples of where the University of Windsor may reach into next.
While there is “a sort of competition for students” among universities, Angell said Windsor’s school of social work offers a unique program, which he describes as “one of the strongest social work programs in the province, if not the country.”
The U of W’s social work masters program is not considered part-time, running over 16 months for those already holding a bachelor degree in social work or over 32 months for those with honours degrees in other undergraduate disciplines.
With a Niagara campus, Angell said his social work school will grow to about 130 off-campus masters degree students, compared to about 80 post-grad students at the Windsor campus, itself host to about 450 undergraduates enrolled in social work.
Angell said the best part of the program is it offers skills upgrading to busy professionals who might not otherwise have the opportunity. That, he said, only benefits the communities where they work.
Opening up campuses in other areas doesn’t mean erecting new buildings. Angell said it can be as simple as arranging a partnership with a local community college, as is currently the case with his school and Barrie’s Georgian College and Peel Region’s Sheridan College. (April 14/09)
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