Within the guiding spirit of our mission statement, the philosophy of the School of Social Work at Illinois State University is as follows:
We believe that faculty, administration, staff, and students must share a common and well-articulated view of the future of our School and that it is the responsibility of all to work toward this vision. A core component of this vision is academic freedom.
We believe that our School must be committed to excellence in research, teaching, and service to the community, and that it is the task of all faculty, students, and administration to continually refine the measures of effectiveness of our research, teaching, and service.
We believe that the role of our faculty is to teach, to expand the boundaries of research, and to apply knowledge through community service to local, national, and international problems and issues in a manner that is consistent with our School's vision.
We believe that the role of the administration of our School is to lead us in defining and setting up management structures that address our School's needs; and to acquire and manage the resources necessary to move toward accomplishing our School's goals.
We believe in participatory decision-making; that is, all faculty, administration, and students have the right to participate and the responsibility to seek and promote informed participation in School decisions. Input from students and the practice community will be sought on specific matters.
We believe in open communication.
We believe faculty and administration alike should be accountable and that performance should be linked with the reward systems of the University.
We believe that School decisions should be debated and formed within the framework of the governance structure.
We believe that all faculty members should be given adequate resources to conduct research, to teach, to do community service, and to promote their professional development.
