A remaining hoop to jump through (Let’s use positive psychology and call it a “goal-post.”) for graduating social work students looming as they walk down the graduation stage is the licensing exam (licensed master of social work, or LMSW), which depending on your jurisdiction, you cannot take until after you graduate (Some jurisdictions, such as New Jersey, currently allow students to take it during their last semester).
This license may not be necessary to work within certain fields of social work (a family preventive services agency I interviewed for didn’t require it for example), but it is an absolute requirement if you want to do clinical social work (i.e., psychotherapy).
As an LMSW, you can generally work as a psychotherapist under the supervision of an LCSW (licensed clinical social worker; abbreviation may vary by state, but it generally denotes the independent practice license), psychologist, or psychiatrist, and will also allow you to begin accruing hours toward your own LCSW.
However, even if you don’t plan on doing clinical social work, becoming licensed can substantially help you in the job market.
Submitting Your Paperwork
1. First and foremost, you need permission to take the examination from your jurisdiction or state. In New York, this involves sending an application for licensure with an application fee (Form 1), and a form requesting that your school send proof of program completion to your jurisdiction (Form 2 in New York).
2. Once your jurisdiction receives this documentation, you will receive a letter granting you permission to register with the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) within a certain time-frame. You can fill out a registration form online, pay the fee for the exam, and once you receive an e-mail confirmation, you will be directed to register for a test site and time.
There is a myriad of literature and preparation courses that help (or claim to help) graduates prepare for the exam. Proceeding with caution is always advised since you don’t want to spend money on test materials that may be inaccurate, not cover the material you need, or not help with test-taking skills.
One of my friends indicated that access to the ASWB’s online practice exam significantly helped him. Aminda Heckman, a clinical social worker and professor that specializes in licensing test prep and held a review at my school (Go check her out, she’s awesome!), also noted that the ASWB sells a $30 prep book at the time of registration. While none of us work for the ASWB or get paid to mention any of their content, it seems rational to say that the closer your test studying material is to the actual creators of the test itself, the better!
Quick Study Tips
Remember those days you decided to skip, I mean, skim class readings? Good, me neither. But if you do, now is the time to pull out those old course syllabi, skip to units you felt weak on, and go do or re-do those readings!
Also, remember, this test assesses your knowledge-base as a general practitioner (unlike the LCSW, which is heavily clinical), so review across many areas: human behavior (ranging from development to defenses), assessment and intervention (Focus on the chronological order of our work, from beginning engagement to intervening!), direct and indirect practice (Don’t forget our macro community roles!), and ethics (In the words of Google, “Do no evil.”). For the latter, honestly, just crack open the Code of Ethics and give it a re-read. A book of ethics isn’t going to give you the answer on what Foofy the MSW should do in situation x when her supervisors have simultaneously called out sick and a t-storm and zombie apocalypse have cut off the phone lines while she urgently needs advice about client y, but it’ll give you the strongest framework for the values behind each question and situation (and hopefully beyond that!).
Become a good test-taker. Nope, this doesn’t mean adopting “tricks” like marking “C” every four questions (Yes, sometimes this worked in high school) or noting that the number of words is inversely proportional to how wrong the answer is, but to read carefully. It goes without saying to not miss qualifying words like FIRST, MOST, BEST, or NOT (obviously). Also, as Aminda Heckman likes to remind her students, this is a standardized NATIONAL test that asks you what a social worker across the board would ethically be expected to do.In liberally paraphrased words, it’s not asking you what Foofy’s agency does or her own beliefs about what to do in her meteorological and supernatural predicament. An excellent way to become a better test taker is to simulate test conditions as closely as you can (e.g., taking a practice test in one sitting and without Doritos and Sunkist. This is not a product placement by the way.).
Be confident that you know this. After an average of one to three years of learning this and several thousands of dollars of debt later, we hope that something has stuck. No, seriously, sometimes we know more than we think we know and it’s just a matter of bringing the preconscious material to conscious (psychodynamic, ha!) and keeping it there in a more organized manner.
Finally, good luck! Again, special thanks to Aminda Heckman, LCSW, for some great review sessions (as well as much of the advice I pass on from her in this article, which I am gladly obliged to ethically credit!) and to an extent, the ASWB, for assuring us of the statistical validity of this test’s ability to test that we know the absolute basic to become social workers that won’t cave under zombie apocalypses that cut off communication to supervisors during client predicaments exacerbated by meteorologic conditions.
