Social work field education in a global world, views from educators
Social Workers in the field are operating under significant stress as workplace ideologies and neo-liberal market principles (Agllias, 2010) place pressure on the human service industry to focus on efficiencies rather than effectiveness (Chiller & Crisp, 2012). Schools of social work are also under pressure which is derived mainly from the need to graduate highly skilled and competent professional social workers within the confines of a neoliberal funding model which dictates that universities do more with less. Of particular concern is the effect on field education placement or practicum, the point where service providers and schools of social work join forces to enhance student learning. The current climate makes it increasingly difficult to source and maintain placements offering quality social work learning environments, particularly for some groups of students. It is therefore necessary to seek new and creative ways of working in partnership with the service providers to secure placement opportunities and enhance the experience for both service provider staff and social work students on placement. Informed by the experiences of field education academic staff from around Australia this presentation offers insight into some of the potential solutions to challenges faced in the current climate, with a focus on rural and remote placements, overseas placements and supporting students from culturally diverse backgrounds. In particular it provides practical strategies and argues for schools of social work and particularly field education staff to work more closely together to share information and guide the development of field education standards and requirements.
Professional Supervision: A Workforce Retention Strategy for Social Work?
Abstract Retaining social workers in the workforce is a significant challenge and a considerable amount of research has focused on identifying and examining the reasons why social workers choose to leave the profession. This paper presents findings collected as part of a small-scale exploratory study into why some social workers have chosen to remain in the social work profession for many years and who consider themselves to be passionate about their careers. In particular, the paper focuses on the potential of effective professional supervision as a factor that can facilitate social worker workforce retention. Supervision was mentioned by all participants in the study as being important for their wellbeing, either throughout their social work career or at particular points along the way, and supervision was also cited as one of the reasons they were still social workers. On the basis of this research, the authors argue that regular professional supervision can increase the retention rate of social worker employees; and it is, therefore, false economy not to allocate sufficient resources for effective supervision.
Aristocratic Century: The sinews of power: political
In his excellent book on the Secretaries of State, Mark Thomson offered ‘the paradox of continuing domination of the aristocracy and the simultaneous insignificance of the House of Lords, per se ’. It is true that, by the beginning of the eighteenth century, the supremacy of the House of Commons in financial matters was a wellestablished convention. The claims of the Commons to an undisputed control over money matters, which had been urged before the Civil War, were resumed immediately after the Restoration and a protracted dispute with the House of Lords began. In 1661 the Lords resolved that there were no precedents in history for this new claim by the House of Commons. In 1671, the Commons retorted that taxation ought not to be questioned by the Lords and in 1678 they reiterated that supply was ‘the undoubted and sole right of the Commons’ and ‘ought not to be changed or altered by the House of Lords’. The Lords' attempt in 1692 to assess their own taxes was also abandoned, though they retired under cover of a rather insubstantial smoke-screen that they maintained their power of amendment to be a ‘fundamental, inherent and undoubted right from which their lordships can never depart’. That established, they departed. Geoffrey Holmes quotes a nice example from 1702 when the bishop of Carlisle found himself the only peer answering to a money bill, ‘no other lord in the House regarded what was doing, this being only (pro forma) to preserve a seeming right to dissent from, or amend, any part of a money bill’.