Behind the Bills: What I learned as an NASW-ND Advocacy Intern
By: Elizabeth Muralt
Coming into this internship as a policy advocacy intern with NASW-ND, having a scope of lived experience as I spent 14 years within the foster care system experiencing social work, policies and programs as a consumer was a profound experience for me. My lived experiences of my time in care allowed me to bring a unique level of understanding and valuable insights to important topics within the bills that were introduced. Bills relating to foster care parents and biological parents rights and regulations, child abuse and neglect, the regulation of social work, the criminal justice system and implementing re-entry programs provided me an outlet to showcase my perspectives through reflective sharing and writing testimony. It was rewarding to use my experiences of adversities to attempt to create change within the state of North Dakota through advocacy and educating others on what these bills effects realistically look like for those who they aim to serve or unintendedly neglect.
As an undergraduate BSW student, I learned through my experiences within internship through the legislative session that you don’t need a title or a specific degree to be an advocate or leader. That every individual whether they have a title or no title, degree or no degree has a unique story and experiences within various areas and systems that looks different to others. This allows every individual an opportunity to be an advocate or leader, to provide others with a specialized insight and to humanize the issues on different topics and objectives addressed within bills, policies and programs.
Through my experience at NASW-ND as a policy advocacy intern, I also learned that advocacy can start before you obtain your degree. Making sure that you are educating yourself within the area of politics, and getting involved in voting that your vote does matter. Getting involved in the legislative session through writing testimony on personal areas of interests using your unique story and perspectives. Or whether it’s just staying up to date on what is happening within our state through the legislative session to maintain competency and further your knowledge on various topics. Being able to relay the important information on various bills, their effects and potential outcomes with my social work cohort at NDSU was a good feeling to educate others on how they can get involved in advocacy and how these bills could affect the profession we aim to serve in and the individuals that we aim to serve as well.
Last but not least, my internship experience showed me the importance of how to strategize and collaborate with other agency’s on different bills. Displaying the power of advocacy when you are unified on the same agenda and objectives in larger numbers. The work we did in developing strategies, writing testimony and sharing information to others exemplified the importance of peer reviewed research and the importance of furthering your education in various areas and sharing what you know with others. Witnessing the complexities of the many components of legislative session and what it takes to create and implement a bill was a one of a kind learning experience.
Overall, my experience with NASW- ND as a policy advocacy intern was incredibly rewarding. This experience reinforced my desire and commitment to share my story and experiences to create change for others. It also reinforced my desire to advocate for bills, policies and programs that promote better outcomes for those who experienced or were affected by the foster care system and criminal justice system. This internship not only strengthened my knowledge and skills within policy advocacy, but it provided me a lot of perspective, personal awareness and lessons that I will utilize within my career as a social worker.