Values and Virtues in Action

Liberation and Anti-Oppressive Practice in the Garland School

What are the things that keep us from being free? From living completely free? Maybe it’s family dynamics. They keep us bound up. What role does trauma play in limiting our potential? Do you see the impact of larger systems and social structures on our lives? 

Social work is a profession that focuses on individuals as well as the world around them. We call it “person in environment.“ The Garland School brings a lens of liberation to the profession through our research and teaching, inviting curiosity about experiences and circumstances that hinder the freedom of individuals, families, communities and equipping students to work for justice where people experience the limiting forces of oppression and marginalization. 

We seek to educate ethical social work practitioners committed to the liberation and empowerment of all people. In social work, anti-oppressive practice is a professional commitment seen across our curriculum. The virtue of liberation guides our expression of anti-oppressive social work, a professional framework that we use in the Garland School to promote our work for justice, honoring the dignity and worth of all people, with a focus on underrepresented and marginalized groups. 

Our approach to work for liberation is informed by our Christian commitment to justice in the face of oppression as well as our professional commitment to anti-racism and anti-oppression. Christianity, as with the major world religions, seeks to challenge power inequities, center the lives of people who have been marginalized, and work for liberation for people who are oppressed. In Luke 4, Jesus describes his own calling as bringing freedom to captives and to people who are oppressed.  In seeking to live the virtue of liberation more explicitly, we desire to be faithful to Jesus’ calling and our professional values. 

Our efforts to use a liberation framework is situated first in anti-racism, as articulated in our Social Work Accreditation Standards, as well as an intersectional approach to justice work related to experiences of ethnicity, national origin, immigration status, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, mental or physical ability, religion/spirituality, age and other marginalized identities in accordance with our professional Code of Ethics.

The race focus of our work includes being actively opposed to racism in all its forms — individual, interpersonal, institutional and structural. As such, we denounce white supremacy, systemic oppression, racism, microaggression and bigotry in any form toward Black, Indigenous, Asian and Latino(a) individuals and communities. We reject all forms of invalidation, hate, marginalization, discrimination and violence. We strive to stand in solidarity with our BIPOC faculty, staff and students and focus on allyship, microresistance opportunities and collaboration to challenge these oppressive forces.

We stand committed:

• To actively and humbly identify as and commit to being an anti-racist and anti-oppressive academic unit of Baylor University committed to the enduring work of the virtue of liberation.
• To the ongoing individual and institutional exploration and examination of implicit bias and systemic advantage/oppression such that our anti-oppressive commitment be reflected in the life and culture of the GSSW through our policies, programs, and practices as we continue to learn about oppression in its many forms.
• To the continual development and implementation of strategies and best-practices that dismantle racism and ethnic oppression within all aspects of the GSSW and broader community.

Baylor University Land Acknowledgment

A Land Acknowledgment is a traditional custom that dates back centuries in many Native Nations and communities. Today, land acknowledgments are used by Native Peoples and non-Natives to recognize Indigenous Peoples who are the original stewards of the lands on which we now live. At the beginning of ceremonies, lectures, or public events at Baylor University, an organization or speaker may offer this acknowledgment on behalf of everyone present. Baylor University’s Land Acknowledgment provides a framework for today’s work with Native Nations and Indigenous Communities. 

Acknowledgment

We respectfully acknowledge that Baylor University in Waco and its original campus in Independence are on the land and territories originally occupied by Indigenous peoples including the Waco and Tawakoni of the Wichita and Affiliate Tribes, the Tonkawa, the Nʉmʉnʉʉ (Comanche), Karankawa, and Lipan Apache. These Indigenous peoples were dispossessed of and removed from their lands over centuries by European colonization and American expansionism. In recognition that these Native Nations are the original stewards of Baylor's campus locations, the University strives to build sustainable relationships with sovereign Native Nations and Indigenous communities through education offerings, partnerships, and community service.

Learn More

To learn more about the named Native Nations and Indigenous Communities, visit their official websites:  

• Wichita and Affiliate Tribes: https://wichitatribe.com/  
• Tonkawa Tribe: http://www.tonkawatribe.com/  
• Comanche Nation: https://comanchenation.com/  
• Karankawa: https://karankawas.com/  
• Lipan Apache Tribe: https://www.lipanapache.org/