Experiences of School Social Work in the Light of Research

Abstract

In the last twenty years, school social work has received increasing attention both in Hungary and internationally, and there is a growing need for the presence of a social professional in educational institutions. Since the mandatory introduction of the service, several empirical and theoretical studies have been published on the subject, which report on the practical experience and the insights of the professionals. In our research question, we looked for the answer to the experiences of the operation of school social work, in studies that were born in the first three years of the mandatory introduction. The selected six studies were analyzed on the basis of three aspects which is the integration of the social worker in the institution, the number of hours spent by the social worker at the school and the characteristics of the development of professional collaborations. The document analysis reveals that the social worker's personality, clear competence boundaries, the number of hours spent in the institution and the level of interprofessional cooperation have great importance for the integration of professionals into educational institutions. The present study aims to contribute to the theoretical foundations of a comprehensive empirical study of the current functioning of Hungarian school social work.