Uncovering issues of ableism in social work education: a disability needs assessment

ABSTRACT

Social work education’s commitment to teaching inclusive social work practice must not only be evidenced in the explicit curriculum and teaching methods, it must also be present in the implicit curriculum including administrative policies, student support, and resources. Yet, accessibility and climate efforts often fall short of addressing disability and ableism as barriers to education, despite the clear call for disability to be included as part of the field of social work’s commitment to social justice. A social work graduate program in the USA developed a mixed-methods disability needs assessment, completed by 586 respondents in 2016. The assessment highlighted the frequency with which students experience ableist microaggressions and lack of support they feel they have, as well as the need for a disability-focused community within the school. Results illuminated the need for education on the depth and breadth of disabilities, advocacy, principles of Universal Design for Learning, and ableist microaggressions. These findings can assist social work educators in developing tangible strategies for more inclusive social work education.     

Suicide prevention on college campuses: What works and what are the existing gaps? A systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Objective: To examine the effects of universal and targeted suicide prevention programs on relevant outcomes in college campuses. Methods: College suicide prevention programs published from 2009 to 2018 were assessed on outcomes including knowledge, skills, self-efficacy, suicidal ideation, and suicidal behaviors. Effects of the interventions on outcome variables with sufficient studies to warrant meta-analysis (ie, knowledge, skills, and self-efficacy) were meta-analyzed. Studies reporting on the remaining outcomes (ie, suicidal ideation and behaviors) were systematically reviewed. Results: Significant increases in suicide prevention knowledge, skills, and self-efficacy were observed in universal prevention interventions that typically employed gatekeeper prevention strategies. Evidence of reductions in suicidal ideation and behaviors was observed across targeted suicide prevention programs for at-risk students. Conclusion: Prevention programs are beneficial for training those likely to come in contact with people endorsing suicidality, but further research is needed to show that suicide interventions can consistently have significant effects on suicidal students as well.     

Strengthening the Domestic and Family Violence Workforce: Key Questions

ABSTRACT

The significant impact of domestic and family violence in Australia calls for a workforce that is both highly skilled and capable of meeting the demands of complex and challenging jobs. Yet despite the increasingly national visibility of domestic violence, the workers—and work itself—have largely remained invisible. We argue for a shift in conversation, highlighting the need for a workforce approach that is not only strategic but that also applies a theorised lens to domestic and family violence work inclusive of both gender and Indigeneity.

IMPLICATIONS

• The domestic and family violence workforce and workers should be made more visible to better support development in this sector.

• A workforce development strategy is needed to build knowledge about who is doing this work, the nature of the work, workplace structures and cultures, and work environments and conditions.

• The significance of gendered power relations, Indigeneity, high risk, trauma environments, and emotional labour in domestic and family violence work cannot be ignored in development strategies.

     

Puberty and Transdiagnostic Risks for Mental Health

Puberty in girls represents a notable period of vulnerability for different psychological disorders. The research literature has primarily considered external and contextual factors that might explain these rises in symptomatology. In the present study, we investigate relations of pubertal status and timing with individual cognitive, emotional, and behavioral tendencies, commonly identified as transdiagnostic processes, in a sample of N = 228 girls (M_age = 11.75 years). We also test whether these transdiagnostic processes mediate associations of pubertal status and pubertal timing with depressive symptoms. Results support greater endorsement of rumination, co‐rumination, negative urgency, and both anxious and angry rejection sensitivity in girls with more advanced pubertal status, as well as in girls with early pubertal timing. Higher levels of transdiagnostic processes fully mediated associations of pubertal status and timing with depressive symptoms at significant and marginally significant levels, respectively. Although the data are cross‐sectional, these findings offer promising preliminary evidence that transdiagnostic processes represent an important mental health risk in early adolescent girls.     

Social Workers who Move into Private Practice: The Impact of the Socio-economic Context

Summary This paper is based on a doctoral research project, conductedin New Zealand between 1993 and 1999, that considered factorsin the movement of social workers into private practice (vanHeugten, 1999). The study employed a qualitative methodologyin which 33 private practitioners were interviewed using semi-structuredquestionnaires. All respondents had at least a first professionalqualification in social work. The research grew from a realizationthat there had been an upsurge in private practice since themid-1980s, during a time of increasingly right wing governmentpolicies, and free market philosophies. These policies and philosophiesled to a radical restructuring of government and not-for-profitorganizations that employed social workers. Some workers respondedto the changes by seeking alternatives to organizational employment.Concurrently opportunities for private practice were createdby the availability of third party payments for counsellingof survivors of sexual abuse and parties to marital disputes.A similar pattern of confluence of expanding social work privatepractice and free market ideology has been noted in countriessuch as Great Britain and Australia. The implications of thismovement into private practice are considered in relation toprofessional social work associations.     

Ethics in context: essential flexibility in an international photo-elicitation project with children and young people

ABSTRACT

Existing literatures have discussed both ethical issues in visual research with young people, and the problems associated with applying ‘universal’ ethical guidelines across varied cultural contexts. There has been little consideration, however, of specific issues raised in projects where visual research is being conducted with young people simultaneously in multiple national contexts. This paper contributes to knowledge in this area. We reflect on our experiences of planning and conducting the International CYCLES project involving photo elicitation with young people in Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Japan, New Zealand, South Africa and the UK. While some issues such as varying access to technology for taking and sharing photos and diverse cultural sensitivities around the use of photography were anticipated in advance, others were more unexpected. Balancing the need for methods to be appropriate, ethical and feasible within each setting with the desire for sufficient consistency across the project is challenging. We argue that an ‘ethics in context’ approach and an attitude of ‘methodological immaturity’ is critical in international visual research projects with young people.     

Improving breastfeeding rates in an “at risk” population

A new public health frontier challenging maternity care is addressing the sub-optimal breastfeeding rates of women who are obese. Despite the World Health Organisation's recommendation that breastfeeding is initiated within the first hour of birth and continued exclusively for six months, less than half of infants and young children globally are optimally breastfed. While initiation rates of exclusive breastfeeding immediately after birth are as high as 90 percent in Australia, this rate dramatically declines in the first few weeks postpartum, with only approximately 15 percent of infants exclusively breastfed to five months of age (less than 6 months). The aim of this paper was to highlight difficulties obese women have breastfeeding and highlight implications for research and practice.     

Pathways to Ready Schools

To encourage communities to play a more significant role in getting kids ready for school and schools ready for kids, the W. K. Kellogg Foundation launched Supporting Partnerships to Assure Ready Kids (SPARK) in 2001. This nationwide initiative emphasized community-based collaboration and the development of strategic infrastructures to support early care and education and school readiness among at-risk children. As part of this initiative, the authors were charged with developing a definition of a ready school. Following consultation with experts, a literature review, and four site visits, the authors identified the following nine pathways to ready schools: children succeed in school; a welcoming atmosphere; leadership; connections to early care and education; connecting culturally and linguistically with children and families; parental involvement; partnering with the community; using assessment results for individual student progress and improving school performance; and quality improvement including professional development and training.     

Audit of advertised housing and support vacancies for people with disabilities in Australia

The introduction of Australia’s National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) has changed the way housing and support are delivered to Scheme participants. NDIS policy reform focuses on coordinated housing and support responses. These responses are guided by the Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA) Rule, Framework and pricing and Supported Independent Living payments. To date, the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) has only released limited data to understand SDA demand or inform market development. To understand changing housing and support approaches and the impact of NDIS housing policy on market responses, this research had three aims: (1) to examine the locations and characteristics of housing and support vacancies advertised for people with disability; (2) to investigate funding sources for, and providers of, these supported housing options; and (3) to examine the proportion and source of government, nonprofit and private sector funding for housing and support developments advertised. An audit was undertaken of all advertisements on the two main non‐government organisation Websites that list Australian supported housing vacancies. A total of 562 property adverts were reviewed in March 2019. Audit findings are considered in relation to the current NDIS policy context. Possible housing futures and market gaps for people with significant and permanent disability in Australia are discussed.