Today was National Social Workers Day in New Zealand. Palmerston North celebrated this with a lunchtime gathering of the social workers form the Mid-Central Health District Board (43 social workers in the hospital and associated agencies and services), with 18 of us for lunch. It was a nice gathering, and nice to visit with social workers working in so many different capacities, pediatric social workers, mental health, disability social workers, geriatric social workers, rehabilitation social workers, community based social workers. Went for a drink after work with several of them and continued our conversations about the differences and similarities in our world perspectives. I sensed a bit of pride in stating that your profession is a social worker, and it was nice to be with a group of similar minded people. They were very interested in my impressions so far, and my thoughts on social work in the states. Two of the women had done some training in California for a few months, and they had their impressions of our social work system and government funded benefits and such. I will blog about benefits soon. It is very different over here, at least the bit that I have been exposed to thus far. No 60 month lifetime limit on TANF or Temporary Assistance.
It was a nice day to connect to others who are working in this field, and dedicated to social justice and all of the other things involved in this profession.
Thank you Mathew for being a great ambassador and field instructor for me! Here's a photo of us today.
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