Student to Practitioner: A Study of Preparedness for Social Work Practice

Abstract

Australian social work graduates face an increasingly complex work environment where the role of the social worker is often overlooked or misunderstood. In order to examine the anticipated and concrete practice reality for social workers, this qualitative study examined the expectations of social work students preparing to enter the workforce (n=29) and the experiences of new social work graduates in the workplace (n=9). Findings suggest that undergraduates have a realistic understanding of the challenges they would encounter in practice, including anticipated value and ethical conflicts, and allied professions' conceptions of the social work role. They did not anticipate the busyness of the workplace or the level of supervision offered.     

Raising the Titanic: Rescuing Social Work Documentation from the Sea of Ethical Risk

Abstract

One of the most contentious issues in social work practice concerns what should be written about people who access social work services, how comprehensively, and in what format social work assessments, interventions, and outcomes should be documented. The present paper describes a structured approach linked to an action research project that was undertaken by hospital-based social workers to identify and minimise problems associated with documentation in the medical record. The Social Work Ethics Audit provided social work staff with a risk-management tool that highlighted documentation as a key area of ethical risk. Through a process of evaluating existing recording practices, social workers were able to meet the challenge of improving social work recording in medical records, returning it to its proper place as a vital component of clinical and ethical practice rather than an administrative task submerged beneath competing priorities. It was anticipated that the social work documentation proforma that resulted from the ethics audit process would have applicability in other health care settings.     

Dressing the Part? The Significance of Dress in Social Work

This paper explores practice educators' views about the significance of dress for social work in the context of UK social work education. The findings, drawn from three focus group discussions, suggest that practice educators regard dress as an important way in which social workers demonstrate values in action. Dress is also seen to play a part in the development and maintenance of a professional social work identity, and is relevant to the physical and bodily experiences of ‘doing’ social work. Social workers should be aware of the significance of dress and self-presentation, and where student social workers fail to demonstrate such awareness, practice educators may have questions about their understanding of the complexity of practice. The paper notes that while participants expressed similar views about the meaning and impact of dress, these are based on the observation and experience of practice, and there is little research evidence specifically concerning dress in social work. The study contributes to an understanding of why practice educators consider that dress may be relevant in the assessment of a student's practice readiness, and suggests areas for further research about this everyday yet significant aspect of a social worker's working life.     

Narcissism and the Social Work Response

Abstract

This paper reflects on and discusses the relationship between social work knowledge and practice in the context of work with narcissistically-oriented clients. Two subtypes of narcissism postulated in the literature are discussed in relation to the pattern of narcissistic internal claims about self and associated relational expectations. Key messages for social workers are that greater knowledge of the dynamics of narcissism may lead to: accepting and adapting practice based on the idea that narcissistic dynamics have a certain intentionality; applying empowerment models more carefully with this group; better understanding of how to effectively engage clients without reinforcing strong narcissistic tendencies or “results”; and protection of social workers' wellbeing by being able to identify and understand how narcissistic dynamics impact in practice situations. Social workers are urged to critically reflect on and to develop deeper, social work-specific, understandings of personality psychology in the interests of greater practice effectiveness.     

Social Media and Social Work: The Challenges of a New Ethical Space

ABSTRACT

Social media and other online technologies have transformed communication between social workers and service users, with many practitioners engaging and working with clients through social networking sites. While there are numerous ethical issues associated with online practice related to con?dentiality, dual relationships, and boundary crossing, there is lack of clarity about how to deal with such issues. This article uses a case example to develop a nuanced understanding of ethical issues and ethical behaviour in online spaces. We argue that social workers need to link their knowledge of the complex interplay between discourses that underpin daily practice like those related to power, permanency, authorship, audience, embodiment, and professionalism to social media created spaces. In doing this, social workers must retain their commitment to ethical values and critical reflective practice. We conclude with recommendations for education, research, and practice.     

Combating Poverty and Social Exclusion: Implications for Social Work Education

This article considers the importance of understanding poverty for social workers and the ways it is delivered on social work programmes. It reviews the context in which poverty is experienced by service users and social workers. It then goes on to consider the ways in which teaching about poverty has been approached in social work education. Drawing on the experiences of the authors of designing and delivering a module on social work, poverty and social exclusion on a postgraduate DipSW programme it considers an approach to developing poverty aware social work practice for social workers in training. Finally it discusses ways in which the new three year qualification for social work training might develop this subject more fully in ways that seek to combat poverty and social exclusion amongst social work service users.     

Sustainable Social Work: An Environmental Justice Framework for Social Work Education

Environmental degradation is not experienced by all populations equally; hazardous and toxic waste sites, resource contamination (e.g., exposure to pesticides), air pollution, and numerous other forms of environmental degradation disproportionately affect low income and minority communities. The communities most affected by environmental injustices are often the same communities where social workers are entrenched in service provision at the individual, family, and community level. In this article, we use a global social work paradigm to describe practical ways in which environmental justice content can be infused in the training and education of social workers across contexts in order to prepare professionals with the skills to respond to ever-increasing global environmental degradation. We discuss ways for social work educators to integrate and frame environmental concerns and their consequences for vulnerable populations using existing social work models and perspectives to improve the social work profession's ability to respond to environmental injustices. There are significant social work implications; social workers need to adapt and respond to contexts that shape our practice, including environmental concerns that impact the vulnerable and oppressed populations that we serve.     

Social Justice as Concept and Practice in Australian Social Work: An Analysis of Norma Parker Addresses, 1969–2008

Abstract

Social justice is central to Australian social work. Principles of social justice underpin the definition of social work as a profession, its code of ethics, and its standards of practice and education. However, there is a dearth of empirical research regarding what social justice has meant to social work over time and how it has been enacted in practice, topical as social inequalities continue to escalate. As a first-stage study, this paper examines how social justice was represented within 19 Norma Parker Addresses delivered by Presidents of the Australian Association of Social Workers at national conferences between 1969 and 2008. Two key themes were evident: social justice as a concept and social justice as social work practice. Social justice was represented conceptually throughout the Addresses as an enduring guiding principle and moral responsibility for social work. How social justice was enacted in practice included themes of: standpoint; practices and strategies; educating social workers; and contested and constrained practice. The meanings and practices of social justice were embedded within the changing contexts within which the Addresses were delivered. Further historical studies can inform social work knowledge, practice, and critical reflection as the profession continues to evolve and confront persistent social justice challenges.     

Interprofessional Education for Practice: Some Implications for Australian Social Work

Abstract

Social workers work with many other professionals in the workplace and being able to work in a team is both a practice standard for professions and a desirable graduate attribute of most universities. However, student learning about teamwork is often inconsistent and serendipitous, albeit some attention may be given to it as part of field education and work preparation. Students and new graduate social workers usually adopt the teamwork approach that prevails in the agency in which they work and teamwork behaviour is often a result of socialisation and acculturation. Internationally, over the last two decades, interprofessional education for interprofessional practice has achieved prominence in social work curricula. This article covers recent Australian initiatives in interprofessional education and the involvement of the social work program at a leading Australian university in an interprofessional education project. Implications for social work student education and social work practice are discussed.     

Repositioning Risk in Social Work Education: Reflections Arising from the Threat of SARS to Social Work Students in Hong Kong during their Field Practicum

The social work profession has always been involved in dealing with uncertainty and risk in the life politics of clients. However, it is not easy for young social work students to translate this philosophical disposition into their real life practice with clients. In spring 2003, when the SARS epidemic broke out in Hong Kong, a group of social work students from the Chinese University of Hong Kong were doing their fieldwork practicum. Suddenly confronted by a collective sense of risk in their role as social workers, the students went through a period of unrest, as performing their helping duties brought with it a simultaneous exposure to personal risk. This paper is based on four focus group interviews with these social work students, to understand how they processed their experience of risk during their exposure to the SARS crisis, and how they connected the experience to their social work practice with clients. It is found that the predicament arising from the exposure to personal risk brought about by the SARS crisis during the students' field placement engendered the reflective process that enabled a renewed and personalized meaning of professionalism. The results provide a basis for reflection among social work educators on the role of risk in the training of prospective social workers, and on how social work education can better prepare students for practice in a high‐risk environment.     

Change,Complexity, and Challenge in Social Work Education in Aotearoa,New Zealand

Abstract

Social work education in New Zealand is undergoing considerable change as new registration and education policies take effect. Within a complex environment, the major force is the implementation of registration since the passing of legislation in 2003. Parallel to this is considerable change in tertiary education policy. Both the Social Workers Registration Act (2003) and the New Zealand Tertiary Education Strategy (2002) will have considerable impact on social work education. The present article explores the challenges of this environment and briefly considers strategies to ensure that the perspectives of key stakeholders are sought in the development of responses to this complex situation. Students, practitioners, social work educators and researchers, agencies, and the communities we ultimately serve all have a stake in what we do in schools of social work, but have different roles. A review of the system and nature of social work education may be timely.     

Review of Australian Health Related Social Work Research 1990–2009

Abstract

Social workers form a critical component of the Australian health workforce. While their roles as practitioners are very strategic within the health system, less clear is their contribution to health research. This paper reviews the published record of social work research in Australian health from 1990–2009 in order to discern the patterns of the social work contribution to new knowledge in health. The results of this review indicate a tendency to focus on discursive commentary rather than empirical research as well as a less-than-expected focus on client studies. Given the rise of evidence-based practice, there are potentially serious implications for social work in terms of how it positions itself as a contributor to new knowledge within the health field.     

Social Work Students' Research-Related Anxiety and Self-Efficacy: Research Instructors' Perceptions and Teaching Innovations

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to examine social work research instructors' perceptions of research-related anxiety and research confidence among social work students, and teaching strategies to identify and manage anxiety. A national web-based survey of 186 BSW and MSW social work research instructors was conducted. Many BSW (70%) and MSW (61%) research instructors reported that they used specific activities or approaches to assess or impact upon student anxiety. Qualitative analysis results suggested a teaching model for social work research instructors designed to reduce students' research-related anxiety, including by enhancing their research confidence. Strategies that instructors can use include creating a supportive class climate, providing activities that are emotion-, cognitive-, and action-focused as well as the use of strategic timing. These findings can be used to guide social work research instructors' facilitation of students' attainment of research competencies and help further students' research–practice integration.     

‘Stuck In The Middle With You’: Towards Enabling Social Work with Disabled People

This article explores progress to date in embedding enabling social work understandings and practices with disabled people by reviewing the UK social work curriculum. Based on these observations and the ideas from UK disability studies, it will offer possible solutions or at least better pathways to enabling practice with disabled people. As Meekosha has pointed out in a global context, to date social work has been experienced as an ambivalent practice [Meekosha, H. & Dowse, L. (2007) ‘Integrating critical disability studies into social work education and practice: an Australian perspective’, Practice, vol. 19, no. 3, pp. 59–72], often both enabling and disabling; an intervention that can both lock and unlock resources, and challenge and reaffirm traditional notions of the ‘disability problem’ [Finkelstein, V. (1993) ‘Disability: A Social Challenge or an Administrative Responsibility?’, in Disabiling Barriers ‐ Enabling Environments, eds J. Swain, V. Finkelstein, S. French and M. Oliver, Sage Publications in association with the Open University, London]. Social work also has the potential to both challenge, but also be an (inadvertent) apologist for contemporary social support and welfare systems. Indeed it is clear that social work as a profession and social care as a policy area have been the poor relations of healthcare and health professions [King's Fund (2011) Social Care Funding and the NHS: An Impending Crisis?, King's Fund, London]. Viewed anthropologically, social work remains a largely non-disabled workforce ‘ministering’ to disabled clients (BCODP, 1997). This might reinforce the perception of ‘us and them’ in some social work encounters. As Paul Longmore questioned, can we begin to go ‘beyond affliction’ (2003) in our work with disabled people? Can social work help support the collective struggles of disabled people or is their role inevitably to reinforce that of individual(ised) clients?

The development of the personalisation agenda and self-directed support is clearly welcome in this context [DoH (2006) Our Health, Our Care, Our Say: A New Direction for Community Services, Department of Health, London; DoH (2007) Independence, Choice and Risk: A Guide to Best Practice in Supported Decision-Making, Department of Health, London; DoH (2009) Personalisation of Social Care Services, Department of Health, London]. Such developments reflect the changing service user–professional relationship. The temptation to see these developments as the icing on the social support cake needs, however, to be resisted. Arguably, with the increased rationing of social support, the continued role of social workers in assessment and monitoring of support could be seen to require a yet more reflexive and enabling professional education and training in an age of austerity, one where previously supported disabled people are being told that their needs can no longer be met.     

Service User Involvement in Social Work Education: A Case Example

The financial resources provided by the General Social Care Council (GSCC) which supports the education and registration of social workers, has allowed for an increase in user involvement in social work programmes in England and Wales. This article discusses the sources of knowledge appropriate for social workers and social care workers including the significance of the service user knowledge base for social work theory and practice. A project is described which involved students in a consultation process with service users whose role it was to contribute to the students' learning in a particular area, specifically understanding their experience of social workers and the issues of discrimination which they faced and the processes which were helpful in resisting oppression.     

The coping model: what is it and what might be its implications for social work practice?

This article examines whether a coping model developed as a framework for analysis of research interviews is useful in social work practice. The coping model emerged from a study involving qualitative interviews with social service clients in Norway, designed to explore how they coped with challenges in everyday lives, both on an individual level and in interacting with their environment. The model emerged from preliminary analysis and was then used in further analysis of the interview data. The study showed that the informants experienced two major challenges: (1) Unemployment and (2) living with a shortage of money over time, even though their life situations were heterogeneous. Some informants experienced potent coping strategies in finding employment and became independent of social services. Other informants experienced shortages in their capacities for work and continued to be dependent on allowances. They used their coping resources to achieve more meaningful life situations without employment. The coping model represents how coping is understood theoretically in the study and the present paper considers the model's relevance and implications for social work practice itself.     

Teaching the Child Perspective in Social Work Education: Ethical Principles and Classroom Strategies

Aimed at graduate and undergraduate social work instructors, this article identifies the problem of inadequate attention to children in social work education in the US. The authors argue that social work ethics require social work educators to address children as a vulnerable population. They argue that children will be more central in social work education if instructors adopt a child perspective defined by three knowledge categories, development, well‐being and hope, that serve as reference points in teaching. A triangular strategy of position, attitude and action is provided to guide the day‐to‐day use of a child perspective in the classroom. The authors examine sources of the problem, describe its effects on students' education and future practice and provide classroom examples and teaching techniques.     

Social Work Registration: What’s the Contention?

In the face of consistent lobbying for the national registration of social workers by the Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW), the Council of Health Minsters maintains the view that registration is not required, placing it at odds with comparable countries around the world. One factor that shapes this current decision is the view that social work does not pose a significant risk to the health of individuals to warrant the need for this level of regulation. In light of this ongoing debate, the following article provides an overview of the discussion to date, summarising the risks, harms, and the associated costs. Additional evidence of harm and cost are then posited, followed by suggestions for further steps that can be taken to support the Council of Health Ministers making an informed decision on whether or not to include the social work profession in the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme (NRAS).

IMPLICATIONS

• Registration of social work is an under-researched topic. Research will provide much needed evidence to help understand the impact and efficacy of registration in protecting the public.

• Research will inform the Australian Association of Social Workers strategy in pursuing mandatory registration and also support the federal government in its decision making.

• Research in this area may have broader implications for other professions and government policy both nationally and internationally.

     

Social Workers’ Preparation for Child Protection: Revisiting the Question of Specialisation

Abstract

Child welfare work is a key field of practice for social work graduates and for graduates of a growing range of disciplines. In the present paper, the authors drew on a survey of 208 child welfare workers and interviews with 28 senior personnel in child and family welfare agencies to analyse perceptions of the educational preparation of social workers and other human science graduates for this field of practice. The findings indicated that child welfare workers and employers are ambivalent about the value of social work and other generic social science and human services programmes as preparation for tertiary or statutory child protection practice, which involves investigation, assessment, and intervention in child abuse and neglect. The authors argue that the social work profession must better balance generic and specialist aspects to prepare graduates for practice in specialist fields of high social work involvement, particularly in tertiary child protection work.     

The impact of the 2nd intifada on Israeli Arab and Jewish social workers

This paper presents an analysis of interviews with Israeli social workers conducted as part of a study investigating the impact of the 2nd Intifada on the work, clients, views and feelings of Israeli Arab and Jewish social workers. The data were generated from 58 interviews with social workers who volunteered to do so. Coming from a sociological perspective, the study focused on how a violent political conflict impacts on two groups of social workers who live and work in the same society, but are likely to have different views about it. Their actions, views, well-being, and values were researched in a context likely to test universal social work values. The findings document a high level of tension and anxiety generated for both groups, very negative impact on clients’ life and views, largely negative effect on welfare services, co-existing with continuous professional development. Social workers’ views of their own national group and the other national group within the Intifada context highlight primarily the empathy with one's own group while lacking in empathy towards the other group, coupled with suspicion and some hostility. The struggle to maintain professional values is expressed only by a minority. The discussion and conclusions look at what social work can learn from the findings in understanding such complex contexts and the response to the challenge they pose to social work.