The Faculty was founded on April 1, 2008, with the first academic year beginning on September 1, 2008. The newly established Faculty grew out of the former Department of Social Work, previously part of the University’s Medical-Social Faculty. Nowadays the Faculty has two Departments – the Department of Social Studies (previously the Department of Social Work) and the Department of Social Work.

The Department of Social Studies currently offers the Master’s degree programme Social Work for Health Care and the Bachelor’s degree programme Medical-Social Care, both for full-time students.

The Department of Social Work provides teaching to Bachelor-level students as part of the Social Work degree programme – open to full-time students and in part-distance (“combined”) form – and the Master’s degree programmes Management of Social Work Service Organizations (both full-time and part-distance) and Social Work.

The Faculty also offers a doctoral degree programme in Social Policy and Social Work (full-time and part-distance forms).

The goal of the Social Work programme is to prepare trained social work and social/health professionals. Social work is a profession which demands a high degree of ethical and professional behaviour. Graduates find employment mostly as:

• social workers in all public service and municipal organizations
• social workers in the health care system, in education, in the Ministry of Justice or the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs
• social workers in private and church-run charities
• managers in all organizations providing social services
• teachers in schools providing higher social work education
• research and analytical workers in institutions focusing on social problems on the regional or central level