Amrita is India’s only UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality and Women’s empowerment. The Amrita MSW (Two years) and Bachelor of Social Work (Honours Research), under the School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, is a full-time residential program that offers world-class opportunities in the field of Social Work, and the gender equality topic is only one of many strengths in our program. Our social workers are prepared for multiple career possibilities, from working in hospitals, NGOs, government positions, corporate companies, working with communities and individuals, or working at national and international levels. Our program prepares students to take a prominent role in the significant and urgent real-life current challenges facing our world community, from environmental and other disasters, to understanding mental and physical distress of children and adults from the individual to the community, national, and global levels, to being able to critically evaluate and devise innovative solutions for the challenge at hand.

• Among the 3 categories of Deemed Universities in the country, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham is placed in Category-1 by the MHRD, GOI
• Qualified and experienced full-time faculty, including international faculty
• Nationally and internationally recognized experts as visiting faculty offering workshops and seminars
• Wide and diversified settings for concurrent fieldwork, unmatched learning experience through closely supervised fieldwork
• A strong emphasis on exciting research activities to prepare students to publish their own high-quality research papers in peer-reviewed international journals
• Dedicated mentorship and close supervision by experienced research guides on student research projects
• Block placements and internships in nationally & internationally reputed voluntary (NGOs/ INGOs) and corporate organizations, government departments, as well as at the development projects of the Mata Amritanandamayi Math
• Credit-based curriculum and continuous evaluation under semester pattern
• A dedicated in-house ‘Training & Placement Directorate’
• Diverse student body including international students and students from all over India.
• International alliances and excellent facilities and infrastructure
• Unparalleled benefits of living and studying in a large campus

The UNESCO Chair seeks to impact the individual, community and greater society through research, implementation and education.

In its fourth year, Amrita’s UNESCO Chair strives to promote international, inter-university cooperation and networking to enhance institutional capacities and collaborative work. It was in the fall of 2016 that Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham (University) and UNESCO inaugurated India’s first-ever Chair on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment.

Focus areas of UNESCO Chair:

• Designing tools and methods for effective interventional strategies towards the empowerment of women and strengthening gender equality with community’s active and inclusive participation.
• Focusing on six holistic dimensions of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals defined as: safety and security, economic vitality, education, political, social and cultural environment,  environmental quality and health.
• Understanding and mapping the vulnerabilities in communities to finally support India’s progress towards achieving the UN’s 2030 agenda for Sustainable Development.

The Center for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment: where research meets action

The Center for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham is a research-focused academic center for promoting gender equality and fostering women’s empowerment with a special focus on technology and other innovative methods. This center offers diverse courses on key focus areas, pilot radical ideas, and collaborate with leading universities and institutions to advance the initiatives. The center acts as a major resource center for the implementation of various development projects undertaken by Amrita University and its parent organization, MA Math.

The CWEGE mission is built upon the three pillars of education, implementation, and action research.

The CWEGE research agenda continues with a system’s thinking-based approach to mapping women’s vulnerabilities throughout rural India. The approach remains focused through the lens of six dimensions ((i) safety and security, (ii) economic vitality, (iii) education, (iv) political, social and cultural environment, (v) environmental quality and (vi) health), and how they intersect with the different context levels of women’s lives. Our primary focus over the last six months has been improving and refining our data collection strategies, engaging with subject matter experts in the areas outlined above in order to ensure quality of research, and planning an expansion of our original pilot field venture.

The Amrita MSW is a Two-year full-time residential program that offers the combination of dynamic, innovative, and pioneering practical experiences with academic excellence. We address local and global real-world issues that correspond to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. In 2023, for example, our students participated actively in the C20 Gender and Equality working group.

In line with Social Work principles and ideology, our aim is to influence positive change where it is most needed with an attitude of compassion and selflessness. While strengthening the intellect, our school thus aims also at developing the heart qualities which will help our students to become complete and efficient decision makers throughout their career.

In this light, our students have responded with immediacy to disasters and crises, such as the Kerala floods and COVID-19. They have volunteered on Helplines, with collection and distribution of supplies for relief camps, and with conducting surveys after the Kerala floods, comparing the psychological wellbeing of those in more damaged versus less damaged areas and making referral for treatment when needed. We also have a strong commitment to working with the most impoverished, marginalized communities who experience immense ongoing life challenges, and our MSW students actively participate in this work. For example, our diverse and exciting fieldwork and research activities have afforded students unique opportunities to work with marginalized groups on such topics as:

• Working with rural villagers to address serious water issues such as contamination and its impact on health
• The impact of legal literacy on coping methods of rural women who are subjected to domestic violence
• How lifetime illiteracy has shaped the attitudes and quality of life or impoverished women
• Understanding alcohol use among youth and young adults and its impact on mental wellbeing
• Helping to conduct and participate in medical camps in both hospitals and rural areas
• How natural disasters have influenced stress and agitation among children in child care institutions versus those living in families
• Helping impoverished village communities establish Self-Help Groups
• Community organizing and PRA activities (Participatory Rural Appraisal) in rural village communities to learn about their life challenges and strengths
• Engaging with communities in performing arts activities to explore unique capacities and challenging needs
• Playing sports (football) with rural youth who excel in many skills but avoid academic education because of discrimination
• The influence of pro-social and spiritual values on rates of depression and anxiety among older adults living in care homes vs living in isolation
• The impact of early trauma on the psychological status of vulnerable children in childcare homes, and whether the practice and belief in higher values mitigate depression and anxiety
• Helping forest-dwelling tribal adolescents of school-going age become aware of and using government educational supports available to them

The Amrita social work Program is a credit-based system that allows for flexibility in matters of course design, curricula, time frame, teaching and learning methodologies, and evaluation procedures. The program focuses on improving the higher-order thinking skills of students, such as abstract thinking and problem-solving abilities. These abilities then guide and help students to excel in field work and academic activities. In the Amrita social work Program students will become equipped with enhanced confidence, knowledge, and the skills to address real-world social problems and to think critically about what is going on around them. The aim of this program is to transform dependent learners into independent, life-long learners and compassion-oriented givers. Our students are prepared to embrace the important and dynamic role of social work in the field of global development. Students are required to be skilled and proficient in spoken and written English.

Specializations offered at Amritapuri Campus and Arasampalayam Campus (Coimbatore)

1. Community Development
2. Child Rights and Child Protection
3. Medical and Psychiatric Social Work
4. Human Resource Management (New!)
5. Disaster Management
6. Human Rights *
7. Gender and Social Work
8. Communication for Social and Behavioural Change (UNICEF curriculum)

* This specialisation offers a dual degree option in MSW/ MA Human Rights OR a Certificate in Human Rights from the University of Arizona (USA)