When Values Are Tested: Human Rights and Social Work Students — a Replication Study

Background: Human rights (HR) are defined by the United Nations (1948) as universal freedoms and entitlements inherent to all individuals, principles that align with social work’s commitment to equity, empowerment, and human dignity. Within the United States, however, the connection between HR and social work has not always been clearly articulated or consistently enacted in social work education. HR was included in Competency 3 in the Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards in 2008, 2015, and 2022. Despite these curricula mandates, empirical evidence suggests that implementation remains uneven across programs, raising questions about students’ exposure to and engagement with HR principles. Given the current sociopolitical climate, this study replicates Witt (2020) to explore whether there is consistency among students’ views and levels of engagement of HR over the past five years using the same validated measure within a different geographical and University setting.

Methods: This study employed a quantitative, cross-sectional survey design. Between December 2024 and January 2025, data were collected from BSW and MSW students enrolled in practicum placements during the 2024–2025 academic year at a large school of social work in the northeastern United States. The study used the original 25-item Human Rights Engagement in Social Work (HRESW) scale (McPherson & Abell, 2012) to support direct comparison. Descriptive analyses, independent sample t-tests, and item-level analyses were conducted to examine endorsement patterns and differences by program level and instructional modality.

Results: The current study included 195 students, compared to 171 participants in Witt’s original study. HRESW item-level results were largely consistent across both studies, with high mean scores and strong overall endorsement of HR principles. Both studies found no statistically significant differences in overall scale scores across program modalities (e.g., online versus face-to-face). A notable difference from Witt’s results emerged at the item level. In the current study, upper-division BSW students reported significantly higher mean scores than MSW students on six items (e.g., M = 6.83 vs. M = 6.39, p < .001), with these differences concentrated in structural and policy-oriented HR domains (e.g., incarceration of Black men; rejection of torture as a national security strategy).

Conclusion & Implications: In conclusion, the similarities between the two studies suggest that HR principles are integrated into contemporary social work education. However, the differences observed between BSW and MSW students in this study highlight the importance of context and educational stage in shaping how HR engagement is expressed. These results suggest that HR engagement in social work education may be shaped more by practicum integration and foundational coursework rather than by program level or instructional modality. In addition, these results underscore that educators should not assume students’ endorsement of HR content will automatically increase as they progress through tiers of social work education. Overall, educators should consider how HR content can be revisited and deepened across program levels and modalities.