Practice In Social Work Education Research Articles

The reform of social work practice education and training and supporting practice educators

The BA (Hons) Social Work Programme at University Campus Suffolk (UCS) has just completed a full academic year embedding the new Professional Capabilities Framework (PCF) produced by The College of Social Work (TCSW, 2012) and the Standards of Proficiency for Social Work (SoPS) (Health and Care Professionals Council, HCPC, 2012). UCS fully began this process a year ahead of the mandatory requirement for all Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to introduce these in time for the 2013 -2014 academic year. The new regulatory frameworks were incorporated into the programme to allow an evaluative implementation pilot year and an opportunity for review. This study will set the scene for the important role that practice educators play in social work training and education within the context of recent developments. Despite the disruption created by revision to the teaching and learning on the programme, practice placements and additional training and support required for the social work academics feedback from practice educators and students suggests that the transition was a success. It will also highlight the benefits of the new frameworks in relation to the training and support that was provided, the need for the on-going training and support for practice educators as well as considering lessons to be learned and revisions needed for the next academic year.

Ego Psychological Contributions to Understanding Psychopharmacology and Clinical Practice in Social Work Education

Due to increasing evidence that supports the efficacy of combined pharmacology and psychotherapy in the treatment of multiple psychiatric disorders, an educational focus on integrated approaches is growing in social work and related fields. However, there are few guiding clinical theoretical models that can help students integrate pharmacology and clinical issues. The authors propose that ego psychology can advance clinical knowledge by helping students understand pharmacological issues and integrate pharmacotherapy with psychotherapy. Assessing ego functions in response to medication referral and use contributes to enhanced assessment and treatment.

Critical Practice for Challenging Times: Social Workers' Engagement with Community Work

The contribution that social workers make to communities is integral to the principles and values of the profession but is often ‘hidden’ and unacknowledged. This paper is an exploration of social workers' engagement with community work approaches in a range of settings in the Republic of Ireland, where managerialism and a climate of austerity pose particular challenges for social work practice. By exploring the findings of qualitative interviews with social work practitioners, the paper examines themes and issues that emerge in the context of their practice settings and considers how community work ideas are enacted in contemporary social work practice. These ideas challenge dominant discourses and emphasise a process of active engagement with communities to counter inequality and injustice and seek change at both community and societal levels. The concept of ‘creative activism’ is developed to explore the idea of critical practice and the different forms of collective action that social workers undertake. The use of these ideas to strengthen the links between theory, research and practice on a postgraduate qualifying social work degree is discussed. The paper seeks to re-emphasise the place of community work within social work research, theory, practice and professional education.

The reform of social work practice education and training and supporting practice educators

The reform of social work practice education and training and supporting practice educators

Integrating theory and practice

This paper explores the theme of theory for practice in social work education, taking as its focus the application of a theoretical model called the Three-Stage Theory Framework for relating theory to practice during practicebased learning for social work. The article is derived from a research study carried out over a period of six months and presented for academic award in March 2005.The study demonstrates that the Three-Stage Theory Framework does indeed provide a useful resource for student learning which is currently lacking in social work training; that the process of using the Framework has benefits for student learning, for the development of practice teaching and for social work education in university and in practice. The study also shows that the Framework is flexible, developmental and can be used in different ways for a range of learning styles, stages of training and contexts for learning.

Back to the future:

This article reports on an experience of training social work practice educators in the Chernihiv law College in northern Ukraine. The purpose of the visit was to examine whether the UK values critical to UK social work training were able to transfer to other cultures. During their visit, the authors taught a five-day module on practice learning and used research tools of questionnaire, structural interviews and focus groups to collate and analyse data that sought to examine the transferability of values. Positive changes to practice teaching were brought about as a result of their visit.

Service Users, Social Work Education and Knowledge for Social Work Practice

This paper explores the implications of service user contributions to social work education in the light of historical critiques of disability research. The paper reflects on the authors' dual service user and academic perspectives as well as their dual disability studies and social work disciplinary affiliations. Referring back to early critiques of disability research, it argues that isolated user involvement in social work education can be problematic, particularly where that involvement is under the control of the academy. Drawing on feminist critiques of traditional social science, the authors present arguments for the collective involvement of service users in research and underpinning knowledge for social work as well as in social work education.

Narrative Practice and Social Work Education: Using a Narrative Approach in Social Work Practice Education to Develop Struggling Social Work Students

Placement learning opportunities (PLO) are a crucial component of social work education yet little seems to be known of how practice educators use their knowledge and skills to develop students specifically. This leaves practice educators with a gap in knowledge of how to provide the right learning opportunities to the students they support, which is even more heightened when the student is struggling in their PLO. This paper seeks to fill this gap in social work practice education to show how a narrative approach was used with a struggling social work student in a UK statutory children and families placement. It seeks to show how narrative practice can be considered an effective method of developing a positive working relationship and influencing change within students, while being an effective way of teaching about social work in general.

Evidencing Reflective Practice in Social Work Education: Theoretical Uncertainties and Practical Challenges

Evidencing Reflective Practice in Social Work Education: Theoretical Uncertainties and Practical Challenges

The Feeling of Being a Social Worker: Including Yoga as an Embodied Practice in Social Work Education

As a social work educator and yoga teacher, I have found it curious that the body and embodied knowledge have not been the subject of more debate in the social work literature or focus in professional training. In general where and when the body is mentioned, authors either provide a note of caution warning the practitioner against relying on the body as a source of knowledge and/or a reminder that, as an object, the body has been the cause of much social oppression. Yet, much of social work practice is underpinned by the practitioner's visceral experience. For example, in the process of gathering data to complete a biopsychosocial assessment of a presenting issue that will both inform and guide any intervention strategy, the social worker must navigate both community and clients' physical spaces while negotiating their own somatic maps. Whereas social work education focuses on developing the cognitive and discursive aspects of self-awareness and reflection, recent neuroscientific studies confirm what has long been known in Eastern embodied practices, that the body is the ‘main channel for influencing the mind’. Drawing on the literature exploring the mind–body connection interspersed with my own experience using yoga as a reflexive practice, I argue that making the role of the body more visible in the professional discourse and placing a greater emphasis on embodied knowledge in social work education strengthens the reflexive capacity of future practitioners leading to a greater health and well-being of social workers and better outcomes for their clients.

Student Views on Good Practice in Social Work Education

This article focuses on the delivery of a social work degree programme in England, one of the constituent jurisdictions of the United Kingdom, and explores student perceptions of their learning experience and what constitutes effective teaching. The data are drawn from a larger research project which is ongoing and focuses upon the specific ways in which the BSc Hons Social Work degree at a university in the East Midlands prepares students to meet the demands of employers. Linked to the national evaluation of the new social work degree, social work academics at the university worked with final year social work degree students as co-researchers to evaluate student views on the quality of teaching practices across the teaching team.

When African American Teen Girls’ Friends Are Murdered: A Qualitative Study of Bereavement, Coping, and Psychosocial Consequences

This qualitative study examines how African American teen girls grieve the loss of their friends who die from murder. Semistructured interviews were held with 21 African American teenage girls who experienced such a loss. The data analysis was guided by grounded theory. The emergent themes were classified into 3 major areas: mourning, coping, and psychosocial consequences. The mourning experiences ranged from uncomplicated bereavement to traumatic grief and depression. Three coping strategies emerged from the data: private strategies, public strategies, and context support strategies. Psychosocial consequences included associated losses, living challenges, and aspects of resilience consisting of constitutional factors, meaning-making efforts, and contextual supports of the participants. The implications for social work practice and social work education are discussed.

Out and Proud? Social Work's Relationship with Lesbian and Gay Equality

Major changes in the UK legislative framework to promote the rights of lesbians and gay men have challenged and challenge long-standing heteronormative and heterosexist frames of reference in both social work practice and professional education and the way these are organised. At the same time, government policy within ‘transformation’ and ‘integrated’ agendas and recent reviews of the role of social work provide many opportunities for social work to respond in new and different ways to the proposed changes. This Critical Commentary looks at the implications for increased visibility of sexuality within social work and the complexity of managing identities. We will examine how these are debated within the current social, political and legislative environment.

A New Perspective: The Common Factors Model as a Foundation for Social Work Practice Education

Foundation social work practice education is critical to the preparation of BSW practitioners for professional practice and the establishment of a theoretical and skill base upon which graduate students may build competencies in the advanced curriculum. Issues in the foundation practice curriculum may hinder this development. The common factors model holds promise as an organizing framework for foundation social work practice education. This model may help to resolve some key issues in social work and social work education, and may provide a useful, coherent, and empirical base for the foundation practice curriculum.

From Liberal Pluralism to Critical Multiculturalism: The Need for a Paradigm Shift in Multicultural Education for Social Work Practice in the United States

ABSTRACT The mandate to educate students to work toward ending oppression and other forms of injustice is clear, but there has been little discussion in the multicultural literature about the kinds of knowledge that are needed to prepare students for such work. This article discusses the need for a paradigm shift from liberal pluralism to a critical approach to social work education and practice. It also outlines a set of core themes to guide multicultural curriculum development. These include (a) culture, (b) race and racism, (c) oppression, (d) multiple identities, (e) power, (f) whiteness and privilege, (g) historical context, and (h) social change. Obstacles to incorporating these ideas into the curriculum and recommendations for overcoming such obstacles are also discussed.

Students with Criminal Convictions: Policies and Practices in Social Work Education

In light of the Bichard Inquiry, this paper considers the vetting practices that apply in relation to those students with criminal convictions who apply to undertake social work education in England or Wales. The paper is organized primarily around the lessons that can be learnt from two case studies, and descriptions of how a range of social work programmes in England and Wales assess individuals with criminal convictions. It explores some of the reasons why the assessment of individuals with previous criminal convictions is important, some of the issues that might arise in relation to how it is currently carried out and what might constitute best practice in this area.

Process Recording in Supervision of Students Learning to Practice with Children

This article addresses the use of process recordings insupervising social work students learning to practice with children. Although process recordings are a traditionalmethod of teaching and learning social work practice, they have received little attention in the literature of social work practice and social work education. Process recordings of sessions with children have not been examined. The authors review literature on interviewing children, on process recording and on supervision in socialwork practice. Case examples illuminate how written process recordings can enhance learning and promote a supervisory alliance. The authors propose four key elements of process recordings for practice with children, including full description of play, child's exactwords, child's mastery and student's thoughts/feelings. They conclude that adequately prepared process recordings examined in sequence, over time, reveal progress in student learning.

Teaching Evidence-Based Practice: Strategic and Pedagogical Recommendations for Schools of Social Work

Widespread adoption of pedagogical methods promoting evidence-based practice (EBP) could enhance the effectiveness of social work practice education. Schools of social work should ensure that faculty are trained in the methods of EBP; establish a committee responsible for tracking and implementing demonstrably effective instructional innovations related to EBP; provide continuing education courses that promote scientifically supported practices and that include a course devoted specifically to teaching the methods of EBP per se; reward faculty who model superior pedagogical skills in relation to EBP; provide extensive training in computerized bibliographic database searching and other information acquisition methods; incorporate problem-based instructional methods into all practice courses; employ skills-based in vivo assessments and other measures to ensure student-practitioner competency in EBP methods prior to graduation; emphasize specialty practice education to an unprecedented degree; and test for competence in specialty practice areas.

Implementing Evidence-Based Practice in Social Work Education: Principles, Strategies, and Partnerships

This article views social work education as fundamentally a knowledge implementation enterprise. It proposes principles, partnerships, and strategies through which schools can advance evidence-based practice in social work. Such strategies should meet five criteria: They must be deliberate and strategic, they should be knowledge based, they should reflect the complexity of social work practice, they should capitalize on school and agency core activities and resources, and they should build on natural partnerships inherent in professional education. Their savvy and ingenuity in leveraging existing resources may be the key to schools' success in preparing social work professionals for evidence-based practice.

The Women's Health Movement

With the advent of second-wave feminism during the 1970s, a significant body of literature emerged describing sexist practices in women's health care. Gender-bias and gender disparities found in women's health care became concerns that garnered considerable attention in the United States because of the increased health risks posed for women. This article describes key historical challenges and accomplishments made in U.S. women's health care policy during the quarter century spanning 1970-1995 that influence contemporary health care social work practice and social work education.