A Comparison of Accelerated and Traditional MSW Students: Twenty Years Later

There has been concern about the ideal length of time to effectively offer graduate content. Programs of less than two full years have been suspect. Thus study reports on two groups of social workers in the same program who have been professionally active for over twenty years. They completed the master's requirements under two different time conditions: One group completed study in twelve months; the other in the traditional two year period. The accelerated group reported the five major curriculum areas were more useful in their practice. In addition, they reported higher long-range achievement scores on the identical objectives of both programs.