| Course | MSW 544 Social Work Practice - Assessment |
|---|---|
| Week | 5 |
| Paper type | Collateral source memo |
| Length | About 380 words, 4 pages |
| Format | Memo with APA 7 citations |
| School | Chamberlain University |
| Program | Master of Social Work (MSW) |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MSW 544 Week 5
Memorandum
To: Field instructor
From: MSW student intern
Date: February 9, 2027
Re: Collateral contacts proposed for V.'s assessment, with V.'s permission for each
The Gap
Two things are missing from the assessment: how the child is doing day to day, and what happened with V.'s medication.
Proposed Contacts
1. Head Start lead teacher. Question: "How has the child seemed in the mornings since January, compared with the fall?" Permission: V. signed a release for this contact on February 5, limited to the child's attendance and mood.
2. Primary care physician. Question: "What side effects were recorded when sertraline was stopped, and what alternatives would you consider?" Permission: V. signed a release on February 5.
3. V.'s sister. Question: "What do you notice on Wednesdays when you pick up the child?" Permission: V. agreed verbally on February 5 and will tell the sister to expect a call; written release to follow.
Contacts Not Proposed
The county family support program from 2024: its closing summary is already in the file, and V. does not want further contact. V.'s mother: V. declined.
Leaving out a source V. has declined costs the assessment some information, and the memo records that cost rather than hiding it. A client who sees that a refusal was honored is more likely to agree to the next request.
The Source Who Would Disagree
The child's other parent would likely describe V. differently, as disorganized and late at handoffs. V. has not given permission to contact the other parent, and I am not proposing it. The assessment will note that this perspective is absent and why. Assessment guidance treats collateral information as one source among several, weighed for its vantage point (Hepworth et al., 2022).
What I Will Not Ask
I will not ask the teacher about V.'s mental health or the physician about anything outside medication. Each contact gets one question and a short follow-up.
Limiting each call to one question protects V.'s privacy and keeps the calls short enough that busy people will answer. A wide-open call to a teacher invites opinions about V. that are not needed for this assessment.
Timeline
Calls by February 20. Summary added to the assessment by February 27, and shared with V. first.
References
Hepworth, D. H., Rooney, R. H., Rooney, G. D., & Strom-Gottfried, K. (2022). Direct social work practice: Theory and skills (11th ed.). Cengage Learning.
Reading the MSW 544 Week 5 instructions
The collateral source memo is short, itemized and forward-looking. Start with the gap the memo answers: what the assessment is missing. Then list proposed contacts by role as well as name, each with one question and its permission, entry by entry, including the date and form of consent. List contacts you are not proposing and why. Name the source who would likely disagree with the person's account and say whether you will contact them. State what you will not ask. Give a timeline. A collateral memo plans the gathering of information; it is not the gathering itself. If the person refuses a contact, record that and honor it.
Inside the MSW 544 Week 5 example
The gap section names the child's daily functioning and V.'s medication history. Three contacts follow: the Head Start lead teacher, asked how the child has seemed in the mornings, with a February 5 release; the primary care physician, asked about side effects and alternatives, with a February 5 release; and V.'s sister, asked what is noticed on Wednesdays, with verbal consent and a written release to follow. Two contacts are not proposed. The child's other parent is named as the likely dissenting source and not contacted. A section limits each question. A timeline sets calls by February 20, citing Hepworth et al. (2022), with the summary shown to V. first.
MSW 544 Week 5 rubric: what full points look like
Faculty grade the memo on discipline. A list of everyone who might know something loses ground. Credit goes to a stated gap, contacts named by role with one question each and permission recorded entry by entry. Naming the source who would disagree, and explaining the decision about contacting them, shows balance. Saying what will not be asked protects privacy. A timeline and a commitment to share findings with the person earn marks. The memo should be short. Sources on collateral information should be cited in APA, and the person's refusal of a contact should always be honored. A memo that records what the client declined, and what the assessment loses as a result, shows privacy weighed against completeness.
MSW 544 Week 5 help from the desk
Memos most often lose points by proposing many contacts without saying what each will answer. Another common problem is vague permission, such as client agreed, without a date or form. Some memos ignore the person who would disagree, which leaves the assessment one-sided without saying so. Others plan to ask collateral sources about everything. If the person does not want a contact approached, list that contact under not proposed with the person's reason. A memo built this way will let a supervisor approve each call on its own merits. Write each question exactly as you will ask it, so the client can approve the words before the call.
Get a MSW-544 Week 5 example written to your instructions
Send the memo instructions, the rubric and whatever case material your section supplied, and a custom example is written to them and returned inside 24 to 48 hours, the first one free. These are classroom documents built from the vignette you hand us, so no real person's details ever go into one.
More MSW 544 papers and MSW samples
- MSW 544 Week 1: Rebuilding a Borrowed Line Post
- MSW 544 Week 2: Presenting Problem Summary for V.
- MSW 544 Week 3: Genogram Narrative for V.
- MSW 544 Week 4: Ecomap Write-Up for V.
- MSW 544 Week 6: Life History Timeline
- MSW 544 Week 7: Strengths and Needs Grid
- MSW 544 Week 8: Risk Screening Summary
- MSW 545 Week 5: Psychoeducation Handout
- MSW 543 Week 5: Reluctant Client Write-Up
- MSW 546 Week 5: Client Feedback Review
- MSW 542 Week 5: Confidentiality Limits Brief
MSW 544 Week 5 questions, answered
Is a collateral memo the same as actually gathering the information?
No, and the difference is the assignment. The memo plans the gathering and stops there. It says who would be approached, what would be asked, what permission that requires, and what the account looks like either way. Sections wanting the information itself would have supplied the records, and the ones supplying none are testing the planning instead.
How much detail belongs in the permission column?
Enough for a reader to judge whether the release covers the question being asked. Naming the category of information, the person or agency releasing it, the recipient, the purpose and an end date is the usual set. A memo that writes consent obtained, with nothing about what was consented to, is the version instructors comment on almost every term.
What if the person does not want a particular contact approached?
Then the memo records the refusal, keeps the entry, and states what the account loses without it. That is a stronger document than one where the entry silently disappears, because a later reader can see the boundary was set by the person rather than missed by the writer. Nothing in the assignment asks you to argue a refusal away.
Where can I find a free MSW 544 Week 5 sample paper?
The MSW 544 Week 5 collateral source memo, one question per contact and permission entry by entry, is printed in full below.
Who is the source that would disagree in the MSW 544 Week 5 sample?
The child's other parent, who would likely describe V. as disorganized; V. has not given permission, so the contact is not proposed and the gap is noted.