Fall 2026 Unpaid Social Work Internship (Waterloo)

About the role

This is a non-merit internship position with the Health & Human Services - Family Well-Being and Protection. Positions in this class are exempt from the screening and referral requirements of the Iowa Department of Administrative Services - Human Resources Enterprise.

Responsibilities

• Walk alongside Case Managers and Child Protective Workers as they work with families, helping them navigate challenges and build stronger, safer futures together.
• Manage a diverse caseload of children and families that require ongoing service provision to ensure safety (These cases may have children placed in foster care and/or oversight by juvenile court).
• Address the needs of children and families including safety, basic needs such as food, hygiene, education, health, and mental health.
• Evaluate the on-going safety and risk of children by conducting home visits with the children and parents, foster parents, relatives, and others involved while providing timely professional documentation of these contacts and report.
• Upload/e-file timely, accurate and detailed documentation for court involved cases and manage your schedule to accommodate your caseload.
• Respond to situations decisively and effectively (within policy) as family needs change which would include supervisory consultation as needed.
• Engage the family in creating a family-centered plan in accordance to policy that analyze and assess the strengths and needs of the child and family and address on-going danger and risk concerns.
• Assess the ongoing risk to the children, while developing safety plans and make recommendations to various county attorneys and courts.
• Collaborate with medical/mental health community partners, schools, legal partners, law enforcement, local community resources and others based on case needs.
• Professional and timely documentation of referred and provided services.
• Attend court hearings.
• Attend and participate in various training sessions offered by HHS and other partner agencies.
• Understand and use multiple computer programs and data systems.
• Assess the ongoing risk to children, develop safety plans, assess the strengths, and needs of the child and family, and make recommendations to various county attorneys and courts.
• Frequent interaction with law enforcement, medical/mental health community partners, schools, etc.
• Apply Iowa Code, agency policy, and sound professional judgment to highly complex situations involving crises and or chronic abuse or neglect.
• Home visits, detailed interviews, and thorough narrative documentation.
• Confront crisis situations and high stress situations in a calm and orderly manner.
• Maintain confidential information as required by the agency and assuring safety is a top priority for all in the office.
• Obtain information from a wide variety of sources, including written materials, telephone conversations and through computer databases and to be able to read and interpret the data.
• Interact in a team environment to manage group processes, facilitates, and encourages cooperation, pride, trust, and group identity, fosters commitment and team spirit.
• Works with others to achieve goals.
• Interact with employees and customers in a positive customer service manner to resolve problems and answer customer inquiries.

Qualifications

• Currently enrolled as a student at a college or university.
• Ability to work in the United States.
• A valid driver’s license is required.

Skills

• Critical thinking skills and plan development.
• Strong observational and analytical skills.
• Exceptional customer service including de-escalation of conflictual or adversarial situations.
• Ability to respectfully engage families as partners in planning for safety and establish a working relationship with families.
• Excellent oral and written communication and report composition.
• Teamwork, collaboration, and consultation.
• Integrity.
• Strong work ethic.
• Ability to multi-task.
• Ability to manage multiple deadlines.

Benefits

• Possibility to observe parts of the Child Protection Worker role if desired.

Pay

The pay range for this internship is not specified.

Schedule

Internship hours are typically Monday-Friday between 8:00 AM - 4:30 PM, however, flexibility in schedule is structured with supervisory approval and ideally set before internship begins. There may be opportunities for afterhours experience if requested. If you use your own vehicle, mileage is paid at $0.50/mile travelled according to the Department of Administrative Services (DAS) State Accounting Enterprise Procedures.