Dr Mary McCarthy is a 2019 Fulbright Specialist working to develop a curriculum to strengthen the practice of social work in Indonesia with the Social Work Department at Padjadjaran University in Bandung, West Java

A professional workforce is a foundation for developing strong institutions, which are necessary for civil society development. In 2018, the Government of Indonesia proposed legislation creating a new social work professional degree, which passed in 2019 and which will be implemented nationwide over the next five years. The University of Padjajaran sees this as an opportunity to develop the university’s new social work professional degree.

Dr. Binahayati, a former Fulbright Scholar at the University of Padjajaran recognized the opportunity that the Fulbright Specialist Program offered to her university to help design the new professional degree program. They submitted the proposal to AMINEF to collaborate with Dr. Mary L. McCarthy, Director of Social Work Education Consortium at the University of Albany and was approved.

The collaboration, which took place from September 13 – October 18, 2019, focused on two main programs, which are curriculum development for the Social Welfare Profession Department and building the capacity of our lectures and postgraduates students in international publication.

Dr. McCarthy’s expertise and experiences in competency-based curriculum development and workforce transitions were an ideal match for the two main programs and very well aligned with the work Dr. Widya, the Dean of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences was looking to facilitate.

Through the Fulbright Specialist Program, the University of Padjajaran and Dr. McCarthy had successfully carried out several general lectures for the faculty members and students. Some of the topics they had covered were issues in child welfare, publishing in international journals, and research in child welfare in the US. They also held a public lecture on the Development of Profession Based Social Work Education in Indonesia using the learning experiences from the USA and Taiwan. The public lecture was also facilitated by Dr. Yi Yi Chen, associate professor in Social Welfare at the Taiwan National University.

They had also hold coaching clinic/consultation for journal article writing and publication, a workshop on supervision in profession-based social work education, and discussion on existing & possible research/publication collaboration.

“Each day I participated in exchanges of knowledge and skills with a wide variety of people”, Dr. McCarthy said.

“While the focus of my work was in social work, I also met with faculty from the larger college in Anthropology, Sociology, International Relations, International Development, and Library Sciences. I was able to spend considerable time with students through lectures at the University of Padjajaran and two other universities, and social events with the University of Padjajaran’s students”, she further stated.

She also said that at least once a week, she had the pleasure of sharing coffee and conversation with social work faculty as they prepared for class, worked on assignments or their research. Eight faculty also met with her individually to discuss their publications and had in-depth conversations about preparing articles for publication.

“Preparing lectures, learning from participants about practice in their community, reading 12 articles on current research in the region, having the opportunity for discussion with the authors, and various social interactions provided a rich platform for my learning and understanding about contemporary life in Indonesia”, she said.

“This Specialist opportunity resulted in many new professional relationships that I anticipate continuing. The time went by so quickly and I have returned to the US richer by far”, she added.

She further said, “There are many adjectives that I now use to help convey the life-changing experiences I found through this program; welcoming, fun-loving, curious, accepting, future-oriented, optimistic, engaged, open and receptive”.