15% of Social Work degree students drop out in 2009

Posted on July 26th, 2010

Nearly one in seven Social Work degree students failed to complete their course in 2008-9,
claims a recent General Social Care Council (GSCC) report. The GSCC asked universities
and colleges for the number of students enrolled on to Social Work degree courses. They
also asked for the numbers that did not pass or progress at the end of the academic year.

Community Care analysed the reports, and found that of the 14,550 students enrolled,
2,170 failed to progress on finishing the 2008-9 academic year. It has been suggested that
this figure was not entirely due to academic reasons, with a proportion of the blame being
passed onto other factors such as delayed placements.

Kingston University had the highest non-completion rate of all institutions offering degrees in
Social Work. Edge Hill University was the only institution to report a 100% completion rate,
which may be due to the small size of the course with only 25 students in 2008-9.

Other suggested factors are illness and maternity leave. Professor of Social Work Jill
Manthorpe, who is also the director of the Social Care Workforce Research Unit at King’s
College said “Our work has shown that the non-completion rate is a complex interaction
between institutional and student factors.”


Tags: gscc, independent social worker, social work jobs
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Another Review of Social Work

Posted on July 11th, 2010

We currently wait with bated breath as Professor Eileen Munroe undertakes another review of Social Work in an attempt to inform the Government about the role of Social Workers in order for them to understand our profession. Let us all hope that the outcomes are more effective than some of the recommendations of Lord Lamming which included the implementation of the Integrated Children’s System (ICS).  Without doubt ICS has offered a useful tool for managers to monitor Social Work tasks, ensure targets are met and deadlines kept even if sometimes it means entering an open and closed date on a blank form in order to meet required timescales.

The focus is currently on Social Workers completing tick box assessments on time, leading to quantity of work turn-over that does not safeguard children from harm. The quality of assessments has dipped as Social Workers are forced to use poorly designed forms which encourage repetition of information rather than clear analysis of the needs of families in order to provide them with appropriate Social Work intervention through correct service delivery. 

Most Social Workers understand, without the need for a review that ICS and cumbersome forms only serve to increase the pressure and stress of Social Workers as opposed to enhancing partnership work with families. The consequence for Social Work is a negative identity.

If the Social Work profession does need another review then lets all shout, ‘Come on Eileen…’, let’s free Social Work from this bureaucratic management that seeks to control and command with Social Workers who now as a matter of course repeat the phrase, ‘I will have to to ask my manager’ when asked to make a decision.  Hopefully Professor Munroe’s review will promote Social Work as a profession worthy of respect by Government officials and society in general; this will be a tough task given the Government cut backs, negative press coverage and existing low morale amongst Social Workers.

It will be interesting to see how Professor Munroe’s review addresses the stance taken by Government in supporting the decision to cap Independent Social Worker rates at £30 an hour outside London and £33 an hour in London.  A decision made by Government officials ill informed of the role of Independent Social Workers or the savings made by capping rates. 

Would it be cynical to suggest that a review by Professor Munroe could be a fruitless exercise if budgets and targets are the Government’s bottom line with quality Social Work continuing to play second fiddle to performance indicators and star ratings?

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Place more children in care, says Barnardo’s Chief Executive

Posted on June 28th, 2010

Martin Narey, Chief Executive of the children’s charity Barnardo’s has entered the debate over Children’s Services by stating that 1 in 3 children who should be taken into care are being left with inadequate parents.

Narey, whose previous position was Director General of the Prison Service said the conventional wisdom of ‘social services’ was, “…outdated and placed too much premium on keeping the birth family together”.

Narey has called for greater early intervention, saying that leaving the child with the parents, only to intervene later costs Children’s Services up to an extra £33,000 per child per year.

Narey also called for more looked after children to be placed in residential care as opposed to fostering.  Almost 75% of all looked after children are in foster care, with only 13% in residential settings.

Think-tank Demos published a report commissioned by Barnardos this week which corroborated many of Narey’s statements. The report called for earlier intervention, fewer family placements and upping the age of leaving care from 16 to 18 years.

The report also warns of the dangers associated with the budget cuts faced by care services.  According to Demos,   “The temptation to intervene later and cut frontline spending for vulnerable children would be a counter-productive cost cutting exercise”.

Tags: barnardos, child social care, Independent Social Workers, looked after children
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Chair of Education and Children’s Social Services Inspectorate resigns

Posted on June 28th, 2010

Zenna Atkins resigned as chair of Ofsted last week, amid speculation over the future of the inspectorate.

Zenna Atkins had been the chair of Ofsted since September 2006, and was the organisation’s first ‘chairperson’.  Atkins said in a statement that she had left the organisation to head a ‘global education provider’. She also said that, “Ofsted has achieved much of what I hoped it would achieve.”

Her departure comes in the same week that ministers hinted at their intention to replace Ofsted’s Chief Inspector Christine Gilbert. Gilbert has stated that she intends to stay until the end of her contract, which runs until October 2011.

Atkins chaired Ofsted through many changes, including the merger of the Schools Inspectorate with the Commission for Social Care Inspection in 2007. She was renowned for being outspoken, and often criticised the Civil Service culture.

Non Executive Board Member John Roberts said “Zenna has helped transform Ofsted in her role as its first Chairman. Working closely with HMCI, she has overseen the development of world-class inspection systems, including doubling the classroom observation time in school inspections and the introduction of unannounced inspections of front-line Children’s Services contact, referral and assessment arrangements, helping to ensure the most vulnerable are better protected.”

Ofsted has been criticised heavily in the last 18 months, most notably over the handling of children’s social care inspections during recrimination over the Baby P case.

Tags: independent social worker, Ofsted, social work
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Front Line Social Workers Left Feeling Powerless in Child Neglect Cases

Posted on June 1st, 2010

Action for Children, formerly known as NCH, released figures this week showing that front line Social Workers and Police officers often feel powerless to intervene in cases of child neglect.  The children’s charity surveyed 490 Social Workers and Police officers from across the UK.

The survey revealed that 16% of Social Workers reported a rise in the number of cases of suspected child neglect over the last year.  This is supported by a report by the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, which stated that the number of cases where members of the public and other professionals had brought children to the attention of Social Workers had risen by 25% since the death of ‘Baby P’ 2 years ago.

The research also reported that 37% of the professionals surveyed felt that they had been unable to tackle suspected child neglect early enough to protect the children involved.  50% said early intervention was vital to adequately protect vulnerable children.  Nearly 60% of those surveyed also said that the amount of paperwork, coupled with staff shortages was preventing them from spending enough time with families.

Hugh Thornberry, Director of Children’s Services at Action for Children said, “The threshold for intervention is not a clearly defined line because the symptoms of neglect are chronic rather than acute; professionals on the ground are telling us that they report cases to local child service departments, then have to stand back and watch as nothing happens…  In acute cases of abuse, where there is an unexplained injury, help will be given very quickly, but children suffering ongoing, chronic cases of neglect slip under the radar”.

Colin Green, head of policy for the Association of Directors of Children’s Services’ safeguarding and child protection team said “The problem is that workload is up in all categories of child protection.  The debate we need to have is about capacity in a very stressed system where tough decisions have to be made based on priorities.”

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Is there a route into Social Work without a degree?

Posted on May 27th, 2010

An article in the postgraduate queries section of The Independent has received some attention from the Community Care Blog this week. The article focuses on a question from a graduate interested in a career in Social Work.

The graduate asked, “I will be finishing a BA in public service management in December, and would like to go in to Social Work, but I have been told a Masters Degree is the only way. Is this right? Or does my (relevant) degree give me a shortcut?”

The Independent’s answer is quite succinct, and offers some helpful advice for anyone wanting to enter in to Social Work, but one phrase is picked up by the Community Care Blog. The Independent’s answer includes the statement, “The only way to circumvent this process is to secure a role as a trainee Social Worker, in which case you will be seconded to a relevant course and will be earning a reasonable salary.” The Community Care Blog’s concern about this statement was the suggestion that you could ‘circumvent’ the need to obtain a relevant degree in Social Work to practice as a Social Worker.

Whilst the answer is not wrong, they could have avoided any confusion by adding a little more detail to the answer. The Community Care Blog fleshes out the answer a little by suggesting that it would be possible to follow the NVQ in Health and Social Care route. Through this, you could complete the registered manager’s award, enabling you to manage a service in the Social Care sector.

The Independent does confirm that you are required to complete either an undergraduate qualification, or a Masters in Social Work to practice as a Social Worker, but perhaps should have stated that this is now a requirement to be able to register as a Social Worker with the General Social Care Council.

Tags: independent social work directory, independent social worker vacancies, social work jobs
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Violence is just a change of attitude

Posted on May 16th, 2010

Community Care magazine recently published a series of articles about violence towards Social Workers which has been a long term issue. The situation is not going to be resolved in the short term by a change in attitude from the service users. The very nature of the people with whom Social Workers came in to face to face contact with is that they are usually living on the edge of society. The behaviour of a violent client or substance misusing parent is predictable in so much as at some point they are going to be verbally or physically abusive. The trigger may be stress or a desire not to be challenged about child protection issues.

The solution to the issue of violence lies with the Social Work profession itself and it requires a shift in attitude by Social Workers and their line managers. It is time that Social Work remembers there is another piece of legislation that it is required to adhere to as a profession and that is the 1974 Health and Safety at Work Act. The act clearly states that local authorities are to offer their workers a safe working environment and this includes home visits to service users.  Managers should support this aspect of the Health and Safety Act through comprehensive risk assessments – a mandatory task which few local authorities or Social Workers actively engage in to ensure people’s safety and I include here the safety of the children we are visiting.

Having acknowledged that a local authority or voluntary organisation has a responsibility to it’s work force, the fact that individual Social Workers are accountable for their own and their colleague’s safety should not be over looked. The ‘admin’ person who forgets to telephone a Social Worker whilst they are on a home visit is placing their colleague at risk and should be made aware of this.  The desired outcome is to change behaviour not to blame nor punish – rather an awkward conversation than a visit to a Social Worker in hospital.

Personal safety advice and risk assessments can be met with resistance, Social Workers express they can not do their job if they change the way they work, yet the simplest safety advice is often ignored. It is not too much of a change in attitude to sit in a chair nearest the door, with items that you are prepared to leave behind if a quick exit is required!  

Social Workers by nature seem to place other people’s needs before their own; they frequently charge head long, without thinking in to dangerous situations because their primary focus is to complete a required task within the demanded timescales. Social Workers do not often stop and reflect on the situation that they have become involved in and they can ignore their own doubts when a situation is unsafe.  Avocet advises any of our Independent Social Workers that if they do not feel safe entering a house, then do not go in.  A good Social Worker reports the matter and looks for alternative ways to approach the situation always bearing in mind that if they don’t feel safe in the house then the children probably don’t feel safe either.

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Assessing Single Parents

Posted on April 18th, 2010

An article in The Times newspaper by Ms JK Rowling, celebrated author of the Harry Potter tales and much publicised single mother who lived on state benefits in rented accommodation spoke about the two leading political parties’ polices in relation to single parents.  Ms Rowling champions this family makeup as she was left to care for her four year old daughter whilst teaching part-time after she separated from her husband.  Ms Rowling claims to have been clinically depressed during this period of her life as well as it being the time when she wrote her world famous novels.

Ms Rowling points to the Conservative party’s historical dislike for single mothers, having declared them the ‘worse social evil’ and the root cause for the breakdown of British society.   Interestingly single fathers finding themselves in the same position are often hero worshipped.

Avocet Independent Social Workers frequently undertake assessments with single parents, particularly young parents who seem to create more anxieties amongst professionals and also stimulate outward pouring of scorn from older generations. These single young parents, often living on or below the poverty line find themselves in a situation that the Labour party claimed it intended to rid society of when they swept to power. Today these same single parents are seen as voters and all parties are selling themselves as their champions, signing up to the Gingerbread campaign.

Avocet is actively involved in assessing young parents who have often lived in large families or with step-parents and siblings in a tense, volatile atmosphere. These young people recreate their own home lives, misinterpreting sexual intercourse for love and attention and the cycle of breakdown begins again.

During our experience of assessments with young single mothers, to date none have held Ms Rowling up as a role model. These young people aim to be hairdressers, beauticians or employed in the childcare business. The roles these young parents seek are usually low paid and it is often due to a lack of confidence and low-self esteem that these young people are not aiming higher.  Young single parents need to be encouraged to try to achieve and a starting point needs to be the education system. They require stimulation in order to be valued for their minds, personality and not solely for their looks or wiliness to participate in unprotected sex. This is not a new mantra, but it is one that still can not be resolved by either leading political party.   

These young women need to understand that education is the way for them to develop a lifestyle free from poverty. Ms Rowling is a primary example of the education system rescuing a single mother from a life of poverty. The difficulty comes when low educational achieving young women become mothers and their only reading material is fashion magazines that display their worth through being associated with clothes that attract the attention of males. This point was highlighted this week when a well known high street retailer padded the bikini tops of 7 year olds. This attitude does not help solve the issues of young single parents coming in to contact with Childrens Social Care departments across the UK and requiring assessments by Independent Social Workers.

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Social Workers Criticised by High Court Judge?

Posted on April 13th, 2010

Lord Justice Wall will be sworn in today as president of the High Court’s Family Division, and The Times heralded his arrival with an interview that criticised and undermined Social Workers across the UK.

The Times’ creative reporting skills showed a quote from Lord Justice Wall with ‘Arrogant Social Workers’ in the headline, somewhat misrepresenting the original sentence. Lord Justice Wall’s statement did indeed criticise the actions of Social Workers, but the comment in question appears to have been taken out of context.

Lord Justice Wall said that Social Workers are ‘Perceived by many as the arrogant and enthusiastic removers of children from their parents into an unsatisfactory care system, and as trampling on the rights of parents and children in the process.’ Taking the sentence as a whole gives a different insight into the personal views of Lord Justice Wall, who it seems, was actually making an observation of public perceptions.

Lord Justice Wall did precede this however with the startling comment, ‘What Social Workers do not appear to understand is that the public perception of their role is not a happy one.’  In our role as Independent Social Workers we come across others in our profession on a regular basis, and have found that Social Workers are acutely aware of the public’s perception of their work.

The comments from Lord Justice Wall, coupled with those by Lord Justice Aikens in recent days, in which Lord Aikens likened Social Workers in Devon to ‘Stalin’s Russia or Mao’s China’ can only be of further detriment to those already demoralised Social Work professionals.  Recent months have seen Social Workers criticised and ridiculed for not acting and removing children from their families, and now criticised for doing the opposite. If Lord Justice Wall is to make a difference in his new role then it might be prudent for him to offer some support to Social Workers, rather than providing ammunition for the media to continue their battering of Social Workers in the UK.

Tags: Independent Social Workers, Lord Justice Wall, social work
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Blame in Social Work

Posted on April 6th, 2010

Blame in Social Work is not a new agenda; it is something that most Social Workers discuss on an almost daily basis as the threat of making a mistake sees managers and colleagues taking a step back and leaving an individual Social Worker isolated, in the line of fire from the media and often their own managers. I have worked in Social Work for over twenty years and believe the blame culture is at an all time high or should I say low, as it reaches new depths. With this in mind, I read the story in The Times on Friday 2 April 2010 which reported on Ed Balls allegedly influencing the Ofsted report into the death of Baby Peter to be changed to shift blame on to Ms Sharon Shoesmith’s management.  This claim by The Times will come as no surprise to members of the Social Work profession, particularly those on the ‘shop floor’ completing assessments and working directly with difficult families.

The role of Ed Balls in the dismissal of Ms Shoesmith has been called into question following accusations about deleted emails and re-written reports and the focus of attention being Ms Shoesmith’s management style.  Do Social Workers have sympathy for Ms Shoesmith’s position? It is possible that most Social Workers would feel that Ms Shoesmith’s experience mirrors their own daily struggle to maintain their ability to practice in a profession that is criticised from outside and internally seeks an individual to blame – this time it appears to be Ms Shoesmith.

We wait to hear the outcome of Ms Shoesmith’s claim for unfair dismissal and the potential impact on Social Work in general of this protracted and high profile case of apportioned blame.

I wonder now if the media has a greater understanding of the blame culture within some Social Work management structures, including the voluntary sector – something that is undoubtedly exacerbated by the media obsession for finding and reporting in negative terms on any Social Work story. The Times only needed to look at the Integrated Children’s System  (ICS), which in reality is a management tool that monitors Social Work tasks to ensure Local Authorities obtain the required ‘stars’ awarded by the government.

Target setting instigated by Ed Balls’ government and implemented by senior managers such as Ms Shoesmith has shaped the blame culture in Social Work – interesting that these two are now involved in a public and legal dispute about Ms Shoesmith’s unfair dismissal for poor leadership.

Whoever wins this legal battle can not help Baby Peter now and if the blame culture continues, eroding the confidence of the Social Work profession then children like Baby Peter will continue to be inadequately safe guarded.

Tags: Ed Balls, Integrated Children's System, Ms Shoesmith, Ofsted, social workers, The Times
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