Teaching Note—Challenging Monocentricity in Social Work Education: Creating Critical Counterspaces of Multiraciality

Multiracial individuals and families is one of the fastest growing racial groups in the United States, and social workers are undoubtedly seeing increases in the number of multiracial clients and family systems they serve. Therefore, there is a need for specialized knowledge on multiraciality, including empirically driven and best practice strategies to better prepare social workers to effectively support racial and ethnic diverse clients inclusive of those living multiracially. Drawing from critical multiracial theory, this teaching note systematically examines whether knowledge of multiracial individuals and families is featured in sessions of past Annual Program Meetings of the Council on Social Work Education covering a 12-year span from 2008 to 2019. Findings directly challenge those in the profession of social work to take explicit measures to include representation of multiraciality in the annual meetings as well as other professional social work conferences to better prepare social workers to counteract the established risks disproportionately affecting individuals and families who identify with more than one race.