The processes of globalisation, integration and development of information technologies raise new tasks for higher education stimulating the constant improvement of study process. Education of social workers is not an exception. Rapid social variations gradually change professional characteristics of socio-educational workers, the organization of social work and the needs of the society for social services, which stipulates a changing role of social work as well as raises new requirements for the education of specialists of social work. The main mission of social work is to assist in rebuilding mutual and useful interaction between personality and society as well as to increase the quality of life of the society. The post-soviet countries which are undergoing rapid economic transitions encounter new social problems, such as unemployment, poverty, prostitution, drug abuse, delinquency and other, which even more emphasizes the importance of social work.

The increase of the importance of the local communities' role in social exclusion issues requires new competencies of social workers. Nevertheless, the education of social-educational workers and professional activities in these countries yet do not have long traditions and collected good practices. Thus, these social issues are often solved ineffectively. The request of alterative social conditions for new social services becomes essential in the contemporary society. Thus, professional characteristics of social workers, organisation of social work and requirements for social work education vary as well. The social work specialists are required to have a wide multi-disciplinary preparation and a reflection affecting emancipated mind as well as activity investigation skills.

In the article, our starting point is the analysis of educational factors that influence the development of the main competencies for the effective social work in the community as well as of professional motivation in the social work studies. The starting point of the theoretical analysis is the division of social work competencies according to Madsen (1993), Spierts (2003), Suppes & Wells (2000). The issues of professional motivation as well as the acquisition of social work values are of great importance in the process of empowerment in the social work studies. How to create assumptions for the effective development of the social work competencies in higher education? How to empower a future specialist of social work to function effectively in a local community and reduce the growing problem of social exclusion? The quantitative and qualitative study was based on the methodologies of Giger & Davidhizar (1995), Hoel (1995), Corey (1992) and Kuntze (1994). The sampling was purposeful and had the following criteria: fourth year social work students (n = 445) from the universities in three countries with different economic, social and democratic conditions.

The study was conducted in eight Lithuanian universities as well as in M. Tank Pedagogical University (Minsk, Byelorussia) and in three universities in Sweden in September, 2002 - January, 2003. Based on the results, the relation between educational factors and development of social competencies as well as professional motivation has been analysed from the intercultural perspective. Comparative content analysis (Zydziunaite, 2003) allows to identify the key factors that students described as significant for their professional and personal development during studies irrespective of the socio-cultural context. Current methodological problems of the education of social workers indicate that the education of social work specialists in Lithuania and Byelorussia lag behind the social work education in Sweden significantly. The study is based on the hypothesis that various educational elements are expressed differently in higher education in different countries, which also creates diverse assumptions for development of social work competencies and professional motivation.