Pursue or abstain? Career choices of social work graduates

The transition of social work graduates into the workplace has drawn considerable scholarly attention. Still, we know relatively little about graduating students’ decision whether to pursue a career in social work post-graduation. This study examined the intentions of social work graduates in Israel toward working in the social work profession based on reflective written assignments submitted by third-year BSW students (n = 23). Thematic analysis revealed three main types of career choice: (1) The confident graduate intends to start working as a social worker directly after graduation; (2) The pausing graduate is interested in some time off between graduation and the professional career, due to burnout and fatigue; finally, (3) The ambivalent graduate finds it difficult to decide between interest in social work and the perceived difficulties involved in the profession, including low salary, low professional status and heavy workload. These findings indicate that the choice of studying social work is not necessarily equivalent to pursuing a career in the profession, and emphasize the need for ongoing academia-practice dialogue, as well as for improving social workers’ working conditions to reduce turnover.