November 8, 2011

Pre-Licensure Courses & Qualifying Curriculum

For those of you who don't know, MSW grads who wish to become licensed, that is, become LCSW's, are required to take the following pre-licensure courses prior to sitting for the licensure exam in California:

  1. Human Sexuality (3 sessions) 
  2. Spousal Abuse & Reporting (5 sessions)
  3. Aging & Long-term Care (3 sessions)
  4. Substance Abuse & Reporting (5 sessions)
  5. Child Abuse & Reporting (2 sessions)

In a gracious effort to alleviate some of the costs associated with tuition hikes, the UCLA MSW program announced that the department will offer the 5 pre-licensure courses free of charge to their second year students.

Because the classes can be expensive (up to $50.00 per session online) and time consuming (each session lasts 3-3.5 hours), I was very appreciative that the faculty was willing to schedule board-approved instructors to conduct the courses on campus. I happily signed up for all 5 and started attending the courses.

Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on how you want to look at it), I recently found out a frustrating piece of information that would have significantly changed which pre-licensure and UCLA classes I enrolled in from the start of the year. True to form, the department did not mention that UCLA students can take courses within the department to satisfy a corresponding pre-licensure course.

Just so my readers don't end up taking unnecessary pre-licensure courses, below is a grid that details which UCLA MSW courses are accepted by the BBS:

Pre-Licensure Course
UCLA Course
1. Human Sexuality
Human Sexuality Undergraduate Course*
2. Domestic Violence
SW251: Violence Against Women
3. Substance Abuse & Reporting
SW231: Substance Abuse Intervention
4. Aging & Long-Term Care
SW231: Advanced SW in Aging
5. Child Abuse & Reporting
M203: Child Abuse & Neglect**

*According to faculty at UCLA, the BBS will accept an undergraduate course that contains "Human Sexulity" in the course title.

Buried deep in their website, the BBS has a list of "approved courses" that satisfy pre-licensure requirements (also shown below). Of note is that additional courses might be accepted by the BBS, so long as the syllabus and course title correspond with the pre-licensure course.
ucla


To make it easy for my second year readers to plan out the rest of their academic year, here is a list of UCLA MSW Classes for fall, winter, and spring quarters:
2nd Year Class Schedule

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