Getting licensed as a social worker in Arkansas

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Checked against the Arkansas Social Work Licensing Board on .

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Your board, the portal you apply in, the fees, the supervised hours, and the order to do them in.

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Your first license

Licensed Master Social Worker

LMSW

Exam required before the license

The ASWB Masters exam is required before the license.

Known fees

Fees the Arkansas Social Work Licensing Board publishes for the LMSW
Application filing fee$100
ASWB Masters examination$230
Known total$330

What else it takes

Supervised hours
4,000 hours, 100 supervision, for the LCSW
ASWB exam level
Masters
Licensure compact
Member jurisdictionMultistate licenses are not yet being issued. Last checked against the compact's own site.
Last checked
1

Next step

Hold a master's degree in social work from a CSWE-accredited program. Submit the application, official transcript, and criminal background check to the Board (Section II).

The ladder

Arkansas has 3 rungs. 3 need an ASWB exam.

  1. bachelors

    LSW

    ASWB Bachelors

    Licensed Social Worker. Practice is supervised at this rung.

  2. masters

    LMSW

    ASWB Masters

    Licensed Master Social Worker. Practice is supervised at this rung.

  3. clinical

    LCSW

    ASWB Clinical

    Licensed Certified Social Worker.

Requirements change

Nothing on our law calendar changes Arkansas's exam requirement today. The change that does touch you is national: ASWB launched the 2026 exams on August 3, 2026 with three content areas and 122 items, and held fees at $230 Masters and $260 Clinical. ASWB's announcement.

Law calendar read . If Arkansas moves, this page moves with it.

Already passed? Track your supervised hours toward your clinical license.

Arkansas asks for 4,000 hours of supervised experience and 100 hours of supervision.

Checked against the published rule. Last checked September 27, 2026.

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Programs in Arkansas

How first-timers from each accredited program here did on the ASWB exam. A rate built on fewer than 10 first-time exams is one or two people, so those programs show how close they are to that floor instead of a percent. Source: ASWB, 2025 report.

See all 10 programs in Arkansas

Sources

We read the board's own pages. Nothing here is a guess.

SWTPA is not affiliated with any state board or with ASWB. Requirements change; the board's page is the source of record. This record is also available as JSON.

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