The best books for igniting students’ passions about policy change

To prepare students to critique and reform inequitable social policies, social work educators need to cultivate students’ critical thinking, including the ability to critically examine narratives and presentations of fact that shape what we have come to believe about our country and the legacies of injustice.

Smith’s text does that expertly, through the compelling presentation of significant sites in U.S. history—particularly around slavery and racial oppression.

Students can be assigned to read a chapter about Monticello, Angola Prison, or downtown Manhattan. They’ll be transported to a different place and time, and they will learn to see our own moment differently.

Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book engages students in seeing the natural wonders that surround us, and it calls us to action without resorting to the apocalyptic alarm of many books about the related crises of indigenous oppression and environmental destruction.

The essays and stories she shares are imbued with science about nature and about humanity. Many students find the book soothing, which so many people acutely need in these times of strife and disconnection.

I use excerpts of this text for students in human rights, policy, and community practice courses, and I return to it myself, to be in the presence of a wise sage of our age.

Wilkerson’s scholarship on race and injustice is certainly not a secret, but I still find some colleagues who have not yet read this book.

To convince people to pick it up, I promise that its language is poetic and imminently accessible, and I share the two pieces that have remained top of mind for years: first, Wilkerson’s research about the lessons Nazi Germany took from the racial caste system of Jim Crow United States, and second, the way she crafts an analogy of a crumbling house to make the case for reparations for racist harm, which—like cracks in the foundation of a house you just bought—may not be your fault but are still your problem.

I am forever grateful to Wilkerson for gifting us her insights and rhetorical tools, conveyed so skillfully in this tremendous contribution.

Social work students are people people, so even with the interactive cases and vignettes that connect policy knowledge to practice, it can be difficult for students planning for a career in interpersonal therapy or crisis intervention to connect emotionally to complex policy topics like Social Security reform, net-zero carbon emissions, or criminal justice reform.

Barnett’s non-fiction title on the latter topic is page-turning and infused with heart. It also relates her activism and community organizing, in service of advancing justice in policing and corrections.

This part of her story helps students see how they, too, can take actions—even as an individual—that bear witness to our values and advance toward a vision of social change.

There are many examples in this book that make my students angry—which is one of the reasons I want them to read it.

As people committed to engaging with others to pursue justice, we have to become proficient—if never comfortable—in having conversations with people who do not share our worldview, and in using our active listening skills and deep regard for human relationships to find common ground.

The skills and practices in this book equip us for effective engagement beyond the silos we frequent, help us see our own arguments as others may encounter them, and catalyze the kind of thoughtful interactions social change demands.