Georgian association of social workers (GASW) was founded as an non-government non-comersial organization in 2004 by alumni of the social workers educated in Columbia University in New York and Washington university in St. Louis with the support of host universities and Open Society Institute. Association had no analogous in the field, advocating for introducing and extending the role of social work to protect client’s rights. Nowadays, association unites 600 members, providing for them the opportunity to gain more experience and qualification by working with GASW.
The mission of the association is to protect rights of population and support professional work and practice. The goal of the Association is advocacy of social policy based on effective governance. For the goal attainment, association sets the following objectives:
- Providing the professional expertise to social service providers
- Developing a strong education base (formal and informal)
- Setting and endorsing the professional standards
- Lobbing for the development and implementation of the necessary legal and policy changes
- Strengthening social workers professional network.
Since 2004 the association has been working with non-governmental and governmental departments, local self-governing institutions and universities. Working with them enables GASW to advocate the role of social work in the fields, such as housing, child welfare, justice, crime prevention, school social work and with the groups of homeless and/or children victims of violence, ethnic minorities and internally displaced, elderly, disabled, substance depend people. Working in these fields and with these groups means managing, coordinating, educating, consulting, researching and analyzing work.
The association occasionally involves in voluntarism. The enthusiast volunteers of the association try to help the organizations focused on satisfaction of special needs of people facing social problems.
Association is a member of respectful professsional organizations: the International federation of social work and International council of social welfare.
