Becoming a Social Worker: Realising a Shared Approach to Professional Learning?

Abstract

Social work education has again been subject to scrutiny and review across the UK. Different countries have set about this task in different ways. In England we can observe a top-down process driven by government; in Scotland the approach has evolved more collaboratively. This paper discusses the recent Review of Social Work Education in Scotland within the broader pressures and opportunities of public service reform. At the heart of the Review findings is a simple but timely conclusion: we need to realise a shared approach to professional learning, across the social work career path. This means moving beyond recent preoccupations with social work education, and polarising approaches to reform, towards a genuinely co-owned approach in which professional learning is a shared responsibility and a central feature of what it is to be a social work professional. In closing, the paper considers how we might realise a shared approach to professional learning in Scotland and beyond.

Education for the Crossroads? A Short History of Social Work Education in Scotland

“…Examined in the context of the above discussion, what is striking about recent Review findings is how closely they resonate with the conclusions of previous reviews. It seems there is much consensus about 'what' we need to do to improve education and learning outcomes but much less conviction about 'if' and 'how' we can do that (McCulloch and Taylor, 2018). As always, social work operates in a political and public market and often finds itself playing 'second fiddle' to other more prominent public services.…”

“…The question being posed here is, does social work, locally and/or globally, have a signature learning philosophy and practice that serves as a useful frame for developments in professional education, learning, practice and research? Recent enquiry in this area in Scotland and the UK would suggest not, with troubling effects (McCulloch and Taylor, 2018;Whyte, 2016;Munro, 2011;Scottish Executive, 2006). As observed in the opening lines of this paper, social work education and research has long occupied a tentative place in the academy, and education and learning an ambivalent place in the profession.…”

“…On the one hand, there is relatively little writing, research and/or theorising of social work education (Lishman, 2012); it is not, it appears, the most worthy of subjects. On the other, social work education, in the UK at least, has been subject to sustained political, and increasingly professional, scrutiny and is regularly criticised for perceived shortcomings within the profession and practice (McCulloch and Taylor, 2018).…”