Social work education in the age of AI: Relationality or hegemony?
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Authors
Hallie, Jason
Tunnicliffe, Craig
Tunnicliffe, Craig
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2025-12
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Conference Contribution - Oral Presentation
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New Zealand
Aotearoa
social work education
relationality
hegemony
ethical practice
digital literacy
AI in education
artificial intelligence (AI)
literature reviews
Aotearoa
social work education
relationality
hegemony
ethical practice
digital literacy
AI in education
artificial intelligence (AI)
literature reviews
Citation
Hallie, J. & Tunnicliffe, C E. (2025, December, 1-5) Social work education in the age of AI: Relationality or hegemony? [Paper presentation]. ITP Rangahau & Research Symposium 2025 + OPSITARA 2025, New Zealand.
https://hdl.handle.net/10652/7108
Abstract
QUESTIONS TO HOLD
IF: Social work and social work education are relational activities centered on principles of social justice, diversity and inclusion, and a belief in human potential.
THEN: How can social work educators maintain relational, values-based, emancipatory teaching practice inside an Artificial Intelligence (AI), intensive socio-technical and educational environment?
The International Federation of Social Workers name human relationships as “the engine of social development”. Relationships are at the heart of both Social Work and Social Work education. Both are values based and ethically framed professions and practices, attentive to difference and diversity, and focused on the emancipation of human potential.
The growing use of Artificial intelligence (AI) in tertiary education contexts raises numerous ethical and pedagogical considerations. Central to this are the ways that AI is currently being embedded in recruitment, enrolment and retention, curriculum and assessment design, and potentially within the process of assessment itself. The risks of using of these blunt instruments are the loss of the rich and diverse narratives that social work education seeks to identify, acknowledge and celebrate. The potential hegemony which exists in the provision of mass information controlled by a powerful few data owners who may reinforce their own ideologies.
This literature review is the early investigation by two social work lecturers into researching strategies for the continued relational teaching of social work within an ever-increasing AI educational framework.
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