We, the undersigned, are calling on the University of Maryland, Baltimore's (UMB) School of Social Work (SSW) to implement a permanent, full-time synchronous curriculum option beginning in the the 2022-2023 school year and beyond. While planning for this addition to course offerings, we are requesting the same amount of synchronous course options as there were during the Fall 2021 semester for the Spring 2022 semester.

By limiting the number of synchronous courses that are offered, students are at risk of social, emotional, and mental stress and burn out. Adult learners within this program need flexibility due to familial, financial, and other responsibilities that require us to work throughout the program. To assume that students do not need to work, and do not have multiple responsibilities outside of a highly demanding degree program is an out of touch and off pulse stance by program and university leadership. The flexibility that a synchronous curriculum offers helps to address the burden this program is putting on adult learners. With an in-person curriculum students have to limit their work hours, time with family and friends, and other obligations due to time spent in field, time spent commuting to and from campus for classes, and for work required by courses outside of class. The stress of being taken away from multiple other responsibilities due to university requiring students to take in-person courses when it has been proven they can full-well be taken from the comfort and convenience of our homes without losing substance is wildly out of touch.   

Students need a curriculum option at UMB's School of Social Work (SSW) that is equitable and represents the needs of all students, a curriculum option that allows for flexibility that adult learners need. In President Jarrell’s October 26th email to campus, he stated that among the updated core values is “Innovation and Discovery: We imagine and explore new and improved ways to accomplish our mission of education, research, clinical care and service.” Would founding a permanent synchronous curriculum not be doing just that? SSW has already shown us their ability to support an online curriculum via the adjustments made to accommodate the COVID-19 pandemic. Both students and faculty are acquainted to these convenient options and have seen the positive impacts that it has in other factions of our lives: the ability to work more to meet our financial demands and hold benefits, less time commuting to and from school meaning more time at home, and the convenience of taking night courses from our home. Without these flexibilities and conveniences students are doomed for a continuous cycle of burn out and exhaustion that many students are already experiencing and expressing to peers, faculty, and SSW leadership. The school’s current requirements are causing students to quickly burn out which goes against all ideals of social work that are taught in every one of our courses. Due to balancing the high demand of UMB’s MSW program with other responsibilities, students are unable to prioritize ourselves and, therefore, students are not fully showing up for clients that are met in field or to learn within our classrooms.

We, the undersigned, are calling on UMB’s SSW to implement a synchronous curriculum to accommodate the flexibilities that adult learners need to maintain a healthy lifestyle while enrolled in and completing coursework at the school.