ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the increasingly visible movement to expand social work's connection to the environment and the calls for greater professional engagement in this area. A relatively small, but rapidly growing, body of academic writing addressing issues of social work and the natural environment now exists. Ways in which greater environmental awareness might be introduced into social work education via field education and service-learning activities has also been explored. L. Dominelli and H. Boetto's arguments have direct relevance for the development of a transformed eco-social work education. Transformative learning theory represents an approach to adult learning which has clear congruencies with social work values and methods and which has proven effective in efforts to expand ecological consciousness. Transformed eco-social approach to social work education would allow much of the existing focus of social work education to be retained. M. Gray and J. Coates identify the need for 'a fundamental rethinking of the humanistic values and theories informing social work'.
