EUROPEAN COUNTRIES

EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVES ON SOCIAL WORK: MODELS OF

EDUCATION AND PROFESSIONAL ROLES

Janet Boddy and June Statham1

How do social workers in England spend their time? A key theme of the interim report of the Social Work Task Force was that social workers say they do not have enough time to devote directly to the people they want to help, and feel tied up in bureaucracy. This concern, that social work is too bureaucratic and insufficiently clientfocused, is not new. It predates the implementation of the Integrated Childrens System (ICS), for example, which has been widely blamed for increasing the amount of time that social workers spend on form-filling and electronic recording of data. In these critiques, such indirect social work activities are contrasted with what is described as the real work or primary activity of face-to-face communication with families. Others have argued that the changes to childrens services required by Every Child Matters have both legitimated and marginalised the role of social workers, giving them a clearer focus on safeguarding and on the most disadvantaged children and families, but transferring much of the more general support and early intervention function of social work to other professionals. A related concern is that para-professionals are increasingly carrying out much of what has traditionally been seen as the core task of social work (in particular direct work with children and families), leaving social workers to fulfil responsibilities such as care management and risk assessment which are seen as one step removed from their true role.

What does the evidence say about how social workers do in fact spend their time? A paper commissioned to inform the governments Options for Excellence review of the social care workforce found that most time-use studies report that direct work with service users accounts for a relatively small proportion (between a quarter and a third) of social workers time. However, the reliability of this information is affected by

1https://www.nuffieldfoundation.org.

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differences in how data on time use are collected, by the typically small sample sizes, and a lack of consistency in how activities are defined - for example, what counts as «direct» and «indirect» work. The 2001 Children in Need survey, which adopted a broad definition of direct work including activities such as writing reports for courts, liaising with other professionals and evaluating assessment information, found that two thirds of social workers time was spent directly helping children, young people and their families. It has also been pointed out that case management activities (such as assessment, planning and review) are complex and skilled tasks which are a useful and necessary aspect of work with vulnerable children and families, even when they do not involve face-to- face contact.

In order to assess the validity of claims that electronic recording systems such as ICS have caused social workers to spend less time working directly with families, the Centre for Child and Family Research was commissioned to compare data on the activity of child and family social workers collected as part of a costings study in 2001/2, with similar data (although from social workers in different local authorities) collected in 2007/8. At both time points, front-line social workers reported that they spent 80 to 90 per cent of their time on indirect activities, and felt that they had insufficient time for direct work with children. The data from 2007/8 did show an increase in the number of hours spent on administrative tasks and indirect work for most social work processes. But time spent on direct work with children and families had also increased. For example, more visits were being made as part of planning and review processes. Increased use of placement panels and higher need panels to ensure appropriate placements was also a factor in the increased time needed per case, as was greater liaison with other professionals, both of which could be expected to improve outcomes for children. The study also found that between 2001/2 and 2007/8 average case loads for field social workers fell by a third (from 21 to 14), although average case loads for those working in specialist social work teams (such as children with disabilities, leaving care and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children teams) increased over the same period, from 15 to 23. The main message appears to be that the balance of direct and indirect work has not changed, but the tasks required of children and family social workers within the Every Child Matters framework have become more time consuming.

Social work is increasingly taking place in multi-agency and multidisciplinary team settings. The evidence suggests that such arrangements

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work best when there is clarity about the particular contribution of each agency or service and respect for each others specific expertise, rather than an attempt to do away with difference and blur professional boundaries. A model currently being tested in Hackney is that of Social Work Units, which removes individual caseloads from social workers and replaces this with teams consisting of a consultant social worker, qualified social worker, childrens practitioner (usually not a qualified social worker), halftime family therapist and an administrator, who work on cases together.

The teams progress is checked by senior managers and staff are offered training in skills such as family therapy. The model is currently being evaluated, and although results are not yet available, early indications are promising.

Although there has been much debate about the optimum balance of time between direct and indirect work with service users, there appears to be little hard evidence to demonstrate which aspects of the social work role are linked to better outcomes, and therefore how social workers should spend their time. Service users certainly emphasise the relational aspects of social work: they value workers who are able to develop and maintain relationships, who listen to and respect them, are accessible and reliable and able to view their lives as a whole rather than focus only on particular problems. Service users have less to say about the specific aspects of the social workers role that they find most helpful. This is perhaps not surprising, as users of services are unlikely to be aware of the different tasks that social workers perform as part of their job. From their perspective, social workers typically have insufficient time to engage with their clients. Yet social workers consistently report that it is not possible to complete their work within their contracted hours, and that they work on average at least 10 hours a week more than they are paid for. The tension between the demands of case management, having an overview and fulfilling administrative responsibility on the one hand; and the users appreciation of relationships developed through face-to-face contact on the other, is a common thread in much of the UK literature on social work. Other countries have addressed this tension in different ways, and the main aim of this briefing paper is to consider if there are lessons that could be learned from these experiences.

The qualifications and training of social workers and related staff in England. Since 2003, all social workers in England have been

required to hold a degree in social work, replacing the previous professional qualification of a two-year Diploma in Social Work at sub-

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degree level. The new degree can be obtained either as a three-year undergraduate Honours degree or a two-year postgraduate Masters degree. The content of the degree is stipulated in the Subject Benchmark Statement, published by the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA, 2008), which states that graduates should acquire, critically evaluate, apply and integrate knowledge and understanding in five core areas of study:

•social work services, service users, and carers;

•the service delivery context;

•values and ethics;

•social work theory; and

•the nature of social work practice.

The requirement for practice learning has been increased to 200 days, for both undergraduate and Masters degree, and the minimum age for qualification as a social worker (previously 22) has been removed. This has resulted in a marked change in the age profile of new students, with the proportion aged 24 or under almost doubling from 20% in 2003/4 to 39% in 2007/8 (including 15% aged under 20), whilst those aged over 35 fell from nearly a half to less than a third of entrants over the same period (GSCC, 2009).

Evaluation of the new degree has suggested that students appear to be developing analytical and critical skills but often do not feel well prepared when they start the job. In 2005, a new post-qualifying framework was introduced, with five specialist courses (one of them focusing on work with children and families) awarded by Higher Education Institutions.

Other staff working alongside social workers in social work teams tend not to have a professional social work qualification. They include social work assistants, family support workers and sessional workers (paid at an hourly rate for work such as «befriending» young people). These less qualified staff often undertake much of the direct work with children and families, overseen by social workers who retain responsibility for the case. Data on the characteristics and qualifications of this wider social care workforce are limited. However, research studies that have included family support workers in their investigations have noted the variety of their backgrounds and the fact that they usually draw on tacit or functional knowledge, acquired through practical experience of work with children and young people and/or on vocational competency-based qualifications. For example, nearly half of family support workers in one study had no

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relevant childcare or social work qualification, although they were often carrying out similar tasks to qualified social workers. In another study, fewer than a quarter of family support workers were qualified social workers, and the researchers suggested that one reason they could find little evidence for the effectiveness of the therapeutic family support services provided was that neither family support workers nor qualified social workers had adequate training for the complex work required.

Social care professions in continental Europe. Lorenz, writing about European social work, commented that «one of the central characteristics of social work in Europe is the diversity of titles with which it presents itself». And, as Meeuwisse and Sward warned:

«Even if we stick to the terms «social work» and «social workers», they can have different meanings in different countries, making comparisons difficult».

Social work may be pursued in totally different sectors and by people in different professions, with different roles and responsibilities. Whilst this variability makes formal comparisons difficult, it is useful as an aid to reflection and can offer insights into different ways of understanding and constructing the social work task, and social work professions.

One of the core differences between English and continental European approaches to social work relates to the conceptual and professional framework of social pedagogy. This term is unfamiliar in England, where the term pedagogy tends to be used in the context of the classroom and formal education. In continental Europe, however, pedagogy is a broad theoretical discipline dating back to the mid-19th century. It is a core qualification for direct work with children, young people and families across the childrens sector - including such diverse provision as childcare, youth work, family support, youth justice services, secure units, residential care, and play work. In line with Germanic and Nordic countries, we refer to this theoretical discipline and area of working as social pedagogy, in order to distinguish it clearly from pedagogy in the English sense of formal education.

What is social pedagogy? A useful working definition of social pedagogy is «education in the broadest sense of the word».

Lorenz wrote that it «is always more than schooling, is always the totality of lifelong educational processes that take place in society». In French and other languages with a Latin base (such as Italian and Spanish), terms like education convey this broader sense, and are used to describe the theory and professions of pedagogy.

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Theory and practice are focused on participants everyday lives, working through relationships, and emphasising individual rights and participation in decision-making, and the development of the whole child: body, mind, feelings, spirit and creativity. Crucially, the child is seen as a social being, connected to others and with their own distinctive experiences and knowledge.

The Oxford English Dictionary allows for three ways of pronouncing «pedagogy», although it is often anglicised with a soft «g», as in «psychology» (ped-a-go-jee).

Over the last ten years, a series of government funded studies at the Thomas Coram Research Unit (TCRU) has explored the concept of social pedagogy, as a basis for policy development and as a professional qualification for work in the childrens sector. Across the European countries studied, there are variations in the way that social pedagogy has developed, as well as similarities. Social pedagogy functions as an organic system, consisting of policy, practice, theory and research, and the training and education of the workforce. It thus operates as:

•an academic discipline, studied to higher degree level and beyond within universities;

•a professional qualification, usually to Bachelors-degree level, and based on at least three years of full-time study (incorporating practice placements);

•a field for professional practice in the childrens workforce, both in mainstream services and in child and family welfare;

•a conceptual basis for policy for children and families.

Given the prominence of social pedagogy as a qualification for direct work with children and families, it is not surprising that the TCRU research showed that pedagogues are commonly employed in social care professions. But what is their role and education? How do pedagogues fit alongside other social care professionals? Are they equivalent to social workers in England?

Qualifications for work with young people and families in Europe. As noted earlier, social work in England now requires a Bachelors degree-level qualification, whilst those who work alongside social workers (family support workers, youth workers etc.) tend not to have degree-level qualifications. In contrast, workers in similar support roles in Denmark, Germany and France were usually qualified to at least Bachelors-degree level. Most strikingly, psychologists and social pedagogues were routinely employed within social work practice in Denmark, France and Germany.

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These graduate professionals provided a workforce alongside social workers that was specifically qualified for therapeutic work, and their qualifications base informed the everyday practice of direct work with young people and families.

In all three continental countries, social pedagogues were seen as the specialists in direct work with children and families, intervening with relationships and with everyday lives. For example, a manager in a German voluntary organisation that was providing support services for children and families said her organisation employed social pedagogues because the theoretical basis of their education enabled them to analyse the family as a whole system, to take account of factors contributing to the family situation, and thus, to identify what can be changed.

The need for a therapeutic emphasis in work with young people and families was also highlighted by interviewees in England. However, several argued that the English social work degree fails to prepare workers for a therapeutic approach to work with children and families and child protection work. For example, one manager observed:

«It´s a very English thing; our social workers are not therapeutically trained. We work very well with the legal and protection [aspects of the role], but we dont work very well with the emotional...

touchy feely services are not seen as social work, theyre seen as youth and community work. Thats what I would say from working in the field».

These criticisms need to be viewed in the context of the wide scope and responsibilities of the social work role in England today, and the risk-averse climate in which such work is carried out. In other European countries, the social work role is often shared between a range of professionals qualified to at least Bachelors-degree level - notably between social pedagogues and social workers, with workers qualified in psychology and allied disciplines (such as family therapy) also playing a key therapeutic role in provision. Without further comparative work it is not possible to draw any firm conclusions about the advantages or disadvantages of such a differentiated approach. But it does raise the question of whether too much is expected of social workers in England, having to «do it all».

Social pedagogy and social work. In the three European countries studied, social pedagogy was not seen as an alternative to or substitute for social work, but instead as a complementary profession. Each had its distinct professional knowledge base. Social pedagogues were more likely than social workers to be engaged in everyday intervention with families.

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Their work had some similarities to the family support worker role in English social services teams. However, in contrast with the diverse and lower-level qualifications base of English family support work, the social pedagogues theoretical and professional knowledge informed their approach to intervention. Social workers spent less time working directly with children and families, but their role was not merely bureaucratic. Rather, they held an overview of the case. The social worker was responsible for assessment, for making the care plan with the family and pulling together the different perspectives of those involved with the case. They needed to know the law and what was possible within the law.

In Denmark, social workers were commonly responsible for 30 or occasionally even more cases, with varying levels of need and input. Their direct work with children and families therefore tended to be focused on specific case management tasks, such as assessment and case planning. Social pedagogues, by contrast, were more likely to be engaged in direct day-to-day work with children and families. They provided intervention and support that focused on working with relationships and the everyday worlds of the clients. Several interviewees observed that this distinction in roles meant that, within child welfare, students could choose to specialise in the type of work that suited them. This was said to offer a «creative tension» between the professions, as was observed by a Danish social pedagogue who worked in a mixed team of pedagogues and social workers:

There is a different way of thinking. Those who study social pedagogy focus on care, [social workers] on the law and what is possible within the law. Its important to have mutual respect. ... We become very competent together.

Similarly, a senior social work manager in Denmark commented on the different, and complementary, competences of the two professional formations:

Pedagogues know a lot about children and their development – thats not social workers highest competence so they complement each other. Thats easier said than done but when its done it works well. At the time they take the decision to become a social worker or a social pedagogue that gives a different perspective. Some are very good to write, some better at intervention with families. The social worker is the one who usually writes the plan of action and coordinates – thats what theyre trained for, pedagogues are more [trained] for intervention.

France has a complex and highly differentiated social care

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workforce. Beynier distinguished between four broad categories of qualification in social work, and, within these categories, twelve distinct professional roles, each with its own professional qualification. Social work (assistance sociale) and social pedagogy (education specialise) are distinct Bachelors-degree-level qualifications. Interviewees in the TCRU study emphasised the distinct and complementary skills of the two professions. For example, one service manager observed:

«We have some people in the team who are pedagogues (educateurs) and some [who are] generic social workers (assistants sociaux). The complementarity enriches the team».

This team included educateurs specialises (social pedagogues) and educateurs de jeunes enfants, a distinct profession which qualifies for work with children aged 0-6 years, in a variety of settings.

The pedagogues role was described by respondents as more practical than that of the social worker. It was about doing, and doing with someone and about working with relationships («travailler avec des relations). For example, one pedagogue described helping with childrens homework on a weekly basis. The social workers knowledge was described as more administrative, focused on understanding child welfare systems and making sure that families received the support to which they were entitled. The difference between the roles was described by one social worker who had spent 17 years working in the field of child protection as follows:

The education of social workers is more generalist [than the education for social pedagogues]. [As a social worker] I know [about] social security, financial benefits. ... I studied administration and financial systems, systems of health and of financial benefits; I did more on law. Its very, very general.

Interviewees observations and expectations about the qualities necessary for the work reflected the context of the highly professionalised French child welfare workforce, whereby it was usual for team members to have degree-level or postgraduate qualifications. One service manager described the characteristics his organisation sought when employing a pedagogue:

We need the right kind of people; flexible and adaptable, disponsible2. Its not just the training and qualifications, we need people

2 Disponsible literally means 'available'. In this context, it should be understood as a personal characteristic of openness and willingness.

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who can work with and within the family. [They] need to support and work alongside the family, and above all start where they are at and go at their pace. The pedagogues must be willing to do this work where the walls of the institution do not protect you. They need to respect families and the children but also to work within the judicial framework and understand protection and risk; to help parents to understand the needs of their children; to take the work step by step; to work out with the family achievable steps; and to work through the difficult periods.

Germany has greater differentiation in levels of qualification for social work and social pedagogy than is the case in Denmark or France. As in Denmark and France, there are Bachelors-degree-level Diplomas in social work and social pedagogy, but also a lowerlevel Erzieher training (based on three years of full-time study, but with less emphasis on theory and more time spent in practice placement than for the degree-level qualification). Discussion of the distinction between social pedagogy and social work in Germany is complicated by the fact that - while the two have distinct (albeit related) professional educations - social pedagogy is, as in France, often referred to as social work. However, interviewees in all three areas of Germany visited in the Edge of Care study described a clear distinction in professional roles between staff in local authority social services offices, who held overall responsibility for cases, and the more direct role of workers in voluntary sector organisations. The former were responsible for tasks such as assessment, planning and decision-making, while the voluntary organisations (as is customary in the German system) delivered direct services to children and families, including preventative interventions and residential and foster care.

With one exception (a manager with a qualification in social work) all the social workers and social work managers interviewed in Germany held an initial qualification in social pedagogy, as did all the workers doing preventive work with young people and families. Erzieher-qualified workers also carried out direct work with families, but these less qualified workers were not engaged in the most specialist forms of work such as Sozialpadagogischefamilienhilfe - intensive social pedagogic family support.

This intervention could take varying forms depending on individual needs, but usually entailed intensive therapeutic work with the family for at least six hours a week. In addition, it was very common for workers to have additional specialist qualifications - for example, in family therapy - that corresponded to the specific services they offered. In all

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three areas in Germany, social services offices increasingly specified social pedagogic qualifications for preventative work, along with additional qualifications such as psychology or family therapy.

Several interviewees commented on the value of the social pedagogy degree as a foundation for work with children and families. One worker summed up the principles of social pedagogy as follows: being professional; knowing how to conduct a counselling or advice meeting with a family; knowing how to build up relationships; and understanding (and managing) appropriate distance and closeness. Similarly, another practitioner said that social pedagogy gave her the means to work with myself, and [teaches] constructivism - how people construct themselves - and how to keep a distance, in other words to deflect the temptation for families to think of the worker as their friend. A service manager in another area observed that her organisation employed social pedagogues because the theoretical basis of their education enabled them to analyse the family situation rather than to just see a problem child. A key characteristic of social pedagogy is that it is not primarily deficitoriented, as social work may be.

In the three European countries studied, the difference in focus of social pedagogy and social work is reflected in the content of the degrees. While it is beyond the scope of this briefing paper to discuss the degrees in any detail, the next box presents a summary of the Danish model, as an illustrative example.

Social work and pedagogy: professional Bachelors degrees in Denmark. Both the social work and pedagogy degrees include theoretical tuition and practice placements, with a dissertation in the final semester. However, the degrees differ in legal requirements for their content, as follows.

Social work graduates must be qualified to:

•practise and co-ordinate social work and plan social measures as well as providing guidance and counselling and implementing preventive measures;

•obtain critical and analytic competence with a view to identifying, describing and evaluating social problems in their entirety and choosing relevant methods and measures in relation to the actual situation;

•transfer theories and methods into practical measures and create changes in cooperation with the users and other involved parties;

•establish professional relations with users and be able to enter into dialogue with users and to see their strengths and support them in

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utilising their resources;

•participate in organisational processes with a view to influencing and changing the framework and conditions, and being able to act and negotiate in relation to conflicting requirements and expectations;

•carry out regulatory functions and make decisions while taking into account legal requirements, the actual situation of the users and the practice of the public administration as well as being able to act according to the decisions made;

•develop social work on the basis of documentation and evaluation, implement quality control and to follow, apply and participate in research within the field of social work; and

•continue post-graduate studies on completion of the programme.

The social work degree includes: theoretical/academic content in relation to social work; psychology and psychiatry; law; and applied social sciences (e.g. political and economic science)

Practice-focused education in social work methods. Two

practice placements, totalling six months of the three-year degree. Pedagogy is a generalist education, for work with clients aged

from birth to old age. The degree sets out to provide students with:

•the theoretical and practical competences for social pedagogic work with children, young people and adults, including children, young people and adults with special needs;

•the competences for maintaining, communicating and developing cultural values - not least in relation to people with other linguistic and cultural backgrounds;

•the competences for cooperation, including cooperation with colleagues and other professional groups;

•a basis for developing their pedagogic practice and for contributing to innovation in the field, including research and development.

The Ministry of Education stipulates that the pedagogy degree must include the following:

•Pedagogic theory and practice (drawing on a wide disciplinary base, including pedagogy, psychology and sociology)

•Danish culture and communication

•Individual, institution and society

•Practical study in one of the following areas (chosen by the student): health, the body and exercise; expression, music and drama; arts

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and crafts, or science and technology

Three practice placements, totalling 15 months of the three-and-a- half year full-time degree.

Specialisation within one of the following fields: children and young people; people with reduced functionality; or people with social problems.

Both social work and social pedagogy degrees have course requirements stipulated in law. Both are delivered through state-recognised specialist institutions, but the degrees differ in their emphasis and content, in line with the accounts of practice given above. While both combine theory and practice, the social work degree includes more emphasis on case management responsibilities than the pedagogy degree, which in turn emphasises direct practical work through relationships and everyday activities. Thus, for example, creative and practical subjects such as art, sport, and drama form an important component of the pedagogy curriculum, providing media through which the social pedagogue can relate to clients. These subjects are also valued for their general therapeutic value, in helping clients to enjoy life and feel good about themselves (see Boddy et al. 2006 for a more detailed discussion of the social pedagogue role).

The role of psychologists alongside social workers. In Denmark, France and Germany, psychologists also played a role in child welfare teams. Their role differed from that which forms the remit of Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) in England as a specialist intervention service for children and young people with high levels of need, often with long waiting lists and high thresholds of need to access the service (Ofsted, 2008). In the other European countries studied, psychologists were routinely based within multi-disciplinary social services teams, and it appeared that this embedded their disciplinary perspective within the practice of child welfare.

In France, for example, we interviewed a psychologist who had worked in a neighbourhood social services (circonscription) team for 20 years. She had a caseload of about 30 families, whom she described as the cases causing most concern, and described her role as more therapeutic than that of the pedagogue or social worker. Her role was not equivalent to the function of psychologists in CAMHS in England - it was not a substitute for specialist psychiatric or psychological intervention. She noted that children or young people in need of intensive treatment would be referred to a specialist medico-psychiatric centre, or could be referred to

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a private clinic. Rather, the role she described was concerned with protecting the child, and helping restore them. Similarly, work with parents was, she said, indispensable, so that they could improve their interior lives, enabling them to reflect and develop their identity as a parent and thus reestablish their relationships with their children.

In both Germany and Denmark, psychologists also worked in family houses (called Beratungsstellen, or counselling services, in Germany). For example, one Danish city ran a number of neighbourhoodbased family houses, staffed by pedagogues, social workers, and psychologists, some of whom had additional qualifications in family therapy. These workers offered intensive counselling and support for families referred by social services, but they also offered open-access provision, such as a group for children of alcoholic parents, and drop-in parenting support sessions.

The examples above relate to the involvement of psychologists in direct work with children and families, but these professionals were also involved in managing and supervising social services teams. A psychologist who managed a local authority fostering team in France, for example, described how the whole team met every month with a psychotherapist:

This is compulsory and very important. Its the idea of the team together because the worker is alone [when working] with the family. We might discuss a particular theme or present a case and the analyst encourages us to reflect on the family and what its behaviour may relate to.

The interim report from the Social Work Task Force in England highlighted the need to improve supervision in English social work teams, and the use of professionals with other types of expertise in this role in other countries may be of particular interest. The experience of other countries implies there may be potential for psychologists in England to have a role within childrens social care that goes beyond CAMHS and educational psychology services, to work embedded within social services teams. In other countries, their role may include supervision and support of colleagues within the team; direct therapeutic work with young people and/or families at times of stress such as family breakdown; and preparation for placing children away from home. Currently, in English social work, this wide range of responsibilities is met by social workers or by staff such as family support workers.

Professional differentiation. In the European countries studied, the role of social pedagogues and psychologists, working alongside social

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workers in social services teams, reflected a perception that the demands of the social work task require specialist multi-disciplinary teams. In the words of a Danish social services team manager, you cant work alone with these heavy problems. Its not fair to the family only to have one set of eyes. Professional differentiation was evident in all the countries studied, but France presented perhaps the most striking example. The term travail social (literally social work) encompasses a considerable number of specialist professions, which include the role of assistant social (social worker) and that of the educateurspecialise (social pedagogue).

In France, the teams that organised and provided services for children and families commonly included social workers, social pedagogues, psychologists (as discussed above) and specialists in child and family law. Legal professionals were often employed in the role of inspecteur, a distinctive professional role, with the power to make decisions about the services that can be offered to the child and family. A key element of the inspecteurs role was to determine whether the needs of the case could be met through a voluntary agreement or whether the case should be referred to the public prosecutor for referral to the childrens judge - and legal knowledge was seen as valuable in this role.

Although social workers in England are increasingly working in multi-professional teams, a key difference between England and the other countries is in the level of professional qualification of the other workers in the core childrens services team. This arguably increases the pressure on social workers to do it all, or else delegate what is seen as a key element of the role (direct work with families) to less qualified staff.

Social work professions in mainstream parenting and family support services. The Edges of Care study illuminated the role of social

work professions within specialist services for young people and families where placement away from home was being planned or considered. The other study on which this briefing paper draws is of parenting support in five European countries in more mainstream settings, well below the threshold for considering placements away from home. Findings from this study indicated that social work professionals also play an important role in the delivery of these mainstream services, often working within integrated multiprofessional teams. As in the Edges of Care study, the multi-disciplinarity of these teams was striking. Specialist professionals, including social pedagogues, social workers, psychologists, lawyers and family mediators were all employed in the provision of mainstream parenting and family support, and were often based within universal (or universally accessible) settings, such as schools and family centres.

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In France, for example, a national initiative called the Programme de Reussite Educative (PRE, Educational Success Programme) gives specialist school social workers a key role in early identification and intervention. In this context, the notion of educational success refers not only to success in the school curriculum, but also to positive development more broadly.

An extended role for social work in mainstream settings is also evident in English initiatives such as the deployment of social workers in Sure Start Childrens Centres and schools. However, high thresholds for childrens social services mean that it remains unusual in England for social workers to have a regular role in mainstream provision for children and families. This is despite the fact that those engaged in supporting parents in England tend to have lower levels of formal qualification than their European counterparts, and may be taking on work that is too challenging for their level of training and experience. As the Social Work Taskforce considers the future of social work in England, it may be worth reflecting upon the potential role for community social work in parenting support services - perhaps alongside other professions such as psychology and social pedagogy.

The knowledge base for social work. In considering challenges to social work and the nature of the professional role, it is useful to consider the extent to which the role relies on different forms of knowledge. Cameron and Boddy (2006) drew on a range of studies in discussing the knowledge and education required for care work, noting a distinction between three forms of knowledge:

•tacit knowledge or practice wisdom, derived from personal qualities and experience;

•functional knowledge, of the sort that underpins the NVQ competency-based model of qualification, which is focused on the ability to perform defined tasks to agreed standards; and

•professional knowledge, which combines professional skills (including specific competences) and practical experience with a strong theoretical underpinning.

The argument is that this helps workers to do their job better, be more aware of the effects of interventions, and monitor their own behaviour more self-critically. The idea of using both the personal and professional is a key element of social pedagogic theory and practice. In earlier TCRU research, pedagogues and pedagogy students spoke of having a professional heart, of working professionally with a focus on

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relationships, and, in Denmark, of the psychoanalytic concept of rummelighed, which literally means spaciousness, but which was described in the context of having room in your heart for the child (or client), even if you did not like them. In the continental European countries studied, professional knowledge was seen as essential for direct work with users of services, as well as for social work tasks such as assessment and case management.

Graduate-level qualification for social work is a relatively recent development in England, and it appears still to be accepted that social workers should be the only graduate-level professionals in social work teams. For example, the General Social Care Council suggested that social work tasks with children and families and with adults may be shared between social workers and assistants, support or care workers with the appropriate skills [our emphasis]. This statement implies a reliance on tacit and functional knowledge, particularly for the sort of direct work that is carried out by staff such as family support workers. This reliance on paraprofessionals to carry out what is seen as a core task for social work has been criticised. Such criticisms raise questions about the appropriate balance between qualified and unqualified staff and, fundamentally, about the kind of knowledge (as characterised above) necessary for such direct work. In the context of high service thresholds, and given the nature and complexity of the work, is it reasonable for social workers to be the only graduate-level professionals in the core social services team? Could there be benefits from embedding greater specialist expertise within those teams, as is the case in other European countries?

SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION IN FRANCE: THE IMPORTANCE

OF «WORK-BASED» LEARNING IN TRAINING

Jérôme Wenz3

Europe – «united in diversity». «United in diversity» is the EU slogan. We all of us could hear, yesterday, how appropriate this is to social work education: were all united by certain values that are shared by those within the profession. Were all different too - in our qualifications, our

3 http://docs.china-europa-forum.net/

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routes into education and, of course, in our idea of the skills that we believe are essential to the profession.

In France, the organisations offering social work training leading to a qualification are usually non-governmental and non-profit organisations (NGOs) and not the Universities. Annamaria told us yesterday about this issue.

The reason is that during the 1960s and 70s, when French public authorities wanted to develop social work training, which involved implementing training programmes, they did not approach their own Ministries. Instead, they were approached by non-profit organisations, most often made up of volunteers who were setting up establishments and services for children, teenagers and adults with disabilities or social problems.

These organisations were already in short supply of trained, qualified and skilled professionals, so they were ready to develop training programmes necessary for recruiting the professionals they needed. So, for about fifty years, and still now, French schools of social work are tightly tied to the job market needs. In June 2008, a regional review indicated that 92 % of students who had obtained their diploma one year before (i.e. in June 2007) had found an adequate job as social workers.

They are about 170 schools of social work in France, and many differences between them. Some are care workers training centres, giving skills to practitioners. Others are are Regional Institutes for Social Work Education, quite alike Universities.

The AFPE, of which I am General Manager, is one of these associations. It was created in 1969 and has been constantly developing its training activities, both for care workers and social workers, thanks to funding and support from public authorities.

State-controlled training. In France, the Law specifies that: «public and private institutions offering social work training contribute to the qualification and promotion of professionals and salaried and nonsalaried staff working to combat exclusion, prevent and overcome handicaps or maladjustments, and to promote social development. They participate in the public service of trainin».

Training defined in this way leads to, following a final exam, a professional qualification, in the form of a State Qualification. It is known as «Training leading to a Qualification».

Public and private institutions offering social work training must first satisfy the declaration obligations with the regional State representative (RSR), and are subject to State control.

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Since 2005, these social work training programmes have been free of charge as they are a core training element. They are subject to agreement and funding by the local authority concerned.

But the agreement and funding apply only to core training, meaning that in principal it can only be taken by those who, following education, want to obtain their first qualification for their first profession.

Lifelong learning and research. On the other hand, French Social work training institutions (EFTS) also offer training programmes for social workers so they can improve or update their knowledge and skills or acquire new skills with the aim of professional promotion or redeployment, to build on their professional careers.

This continuous training is mainly funded by the employer, most often by way of compulsory contributions made by social worker employers.

Finally, the French Social Work Training Institutions also carry out social work Research. But trainers are not first of all University researchers, they are experienced professionals above all else. However the SSW in each region carry out specialised research, in collaboration with the Universities such as research platforms and Regional Social Work Committees.

The characteristics of french social work training. In France the various qualifications have always been characterised, up to now, by a Qualification Level, which depends on the position in relation to the French Baccalaureate and the number of years spent in education after the Baccalaureate.

But at the same time, and because of our history, we do not think of settling core courses, but we have been thinking, for a long time, of how to acquire core competences.

Precisely, the recent French reforms in social work training can be seen in the skills standards that now describe precisely which skills have to been acquired in training. These skills are divided into skills areas.

In this way, for the equivalent of a Social Worker, we have :

•a Social Services Assistant Qualification and skills standard,

•a Specialist Youth Worker Qualification and skills standard,

•and a Young Children Worker Qualification and skills standard. All of them are considered as Social workers.

The one element all these training programmes have in common is that they are workbased : at least half of the training course is carried out in the workplace, in a social services or medical services institution.

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Our idea is this: work-based learning must be seen as a means of acquiring skills.

We say: work-based learning is a series of training periods organised between the training centre and the workplace.

But it is not simply about having some training sessions at the centre and others in the workplace.

Work-based learning targets the ability to analyse ones own professional practices, as far as possible, by linking theory and practice in a professional context. A permanent trainer in the Centre ensures this link is maintained by giving one-to-one support for each student.

Moreover, for each students course, we strive to integrate 3 issues :

•apprenticeship and experience in all kinds of professional situations, accompanied first and foremost by the professionals involved (tutor, trainer, apprenticeship supervisor etc.), but also by all the professional teams,

•theory lessons not only with specialists or permanent trainers, but also with working professionals who have hands-on experience in the field in question,

•apprenticeship and experience in the training centre, with a wide range of teaching resources and techniques provided (lessons, conferences, professional practice analysis, resource centre study, workshops, group work, etc.).

We must point out that these professional practice analysis workshops add up to 60 or 70 hours a year, mainly consisting in reflection upon what students live during their placement periods. This requires the students to feel free of talking, free of thinking.

They are expected to describe frankly and accurately what happens in their workplace, in any professional situation on their mind, upon which they will think and talk within the workshop.

Indeed we take for granted every student should develop his own ability to think by himself. Any professional situation is somehow a new situation. Thinking on ones own is the first base of all necessary skills in accompanying somebody else, isnt it ?

But we also believe that this link between theory and practice in a professional context encourages learning and building up experience.

Professionalization is achieved by permanently linking the workplace, currently known as the qualification site with the training centre. To achieve this, we establish work partnerships with each of the workplaces (named qualification sites).

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In this way, work-based learning requires long-lasting partnerships with workplaces. Therefore, we have put various actions into place such as:

1.Regular meetings between professional teams and trainers (internship visits and workshop visits, etc.),

2.The organisation of themed days for professionals in the field,

3.Individual training leading to a qualification for tutors, apprenticeship supervisors and field trainers,

4.Group training aimed at improving the teaching methods of the teams working with the interns.

The importance of quality and content in internships is currently not fully recognised by French public authorities, and this makes it difficult for French Social Work Education to integrate the Bologna process.

So, one of the main objectives for us at the moment is to obtain better European recognition and clarity.

The two challenges we have are :

1)to complete the linking up of French training levels with the European ones (European Qualification Framework) - which defines 8 levels from 1 to 8 in knowledge, skills and competences,

2)to succeed in grading our Social Work educational system into European Credit Transfer System - which is not achieved yet.

Then, we will be able to give all our partners, both in Europe and across the world, a much clearer idea as to what we do and the qualifications we award, for the benefit of professional mobility and all social workers.

SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF

GERMANY

Jakob Braun4

1. Preamble: International Exchange. In a world of mutual dependency and international entanglement concerning political and economic matters, it seems somewhat curious that professional exchange in the field of social work is developed relatively little while the exchange programs in technical fields, in science and social science, have been

4 http://isw.sagepub.com/content/25/2/2

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worked out for a long time. Surely there are some reasons for the following:

1.The development of the institutions for social work education has turned out much more divergently in the different countries than has development of the departments of science and social science.

2.Social work has in general a lower status in society than the traditional academic professions, and it is therefore far more dependent on financial restrictions than other prestige-gaining professions.

3.Social Work is always bound in a high degree to local societal and cultural facts and constellations, to the jurisdictions of the respective countries as well as to the real existing groups of concern.

But in spite of all that or perhaps exactly therefore, a glance over the fence is a valuable scientific and professional enrichment for the social work profession, an act of creating a greater awareness of comparative thought. The recognition of multinational variables in social work education will contribute to an international perspective that will assist the profession in broadening its theory and practice base.

In an exchange program study or practical field work is not the only matter of importance. The experiences of daily life in a foreign country bring to awareness ones own cultural dependency and sensitize the visitor to the differences. This interaction is also a contribution, and for the realm of social work a very important one, to better understanding of ones own behavior and actions as well as those of actual or potential clientele.

This article is intended as a contribution to a better understanding of another social work education system which has much in common with the schools in the United States but which also has quite a few differences. That knowledge might help to reveal advantages and disadvantages of ones own system. While American social work education has been exported to the rest of the world, it is rare for the social work concepts, models, or problems in other countries to make their way back to the social work education system in America. One advantage of making this information flow less of a one-way street may be to make Americans aware of the extent to which American social work primarily is based on just the values of their own social and economic structure. The value of cross national comparisons in fact lie in the opportunities they provide for reflection on the structure of ones own society.

2.Educational Background. The educational system in Germany

performs still a kind of class-structure where, in general, «lower class children attend the Hauptschule (Main School)? middle-class and upperclass children attend the Realschule (Intermediate School or Middle

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School) or the Gymnasium (Grammar School or High School)».

The official language for that system is: As the Federal Republic of Germany is a modern industrial state and therefore a pluralistic, a highly differentiated, society based on division of labour, it needs an education system which in all branches offers school leavers an opportunity to qualify for their chosen trade or profession. The crucial point here is to qualify for their chosen trade or profession. The decision for that choice has to be made at the age of ten, after fourth grade in elementary school. So that cannot be the students choice but rather the choice of their parents, who are bound to their economic situation and economic needs, their own education and school experience, their own consciousness and awareness of the values of school education.

The major disadvantage of that system is in fact the very early selection process and distribution of the pupils with all the attendant long range consequences. The advantages lie in the highly specialized training designed to meet the varied needs of a complex industrial society.

It can be said that the German school system, especially at the secondary level, is strongly selective oriented. The curriculum of the Gymnasium is designed for the demands of later training at the university level while the curricula of the Hauptschule and Realschule are heading for training in occupations or non-academic professions. Since the curricula of the different school types are so different from each other almost no interchange is possible for a student, though some permeability has occurred in recent years. In spite of that closed character often there are some ways to achieve a higher level of education if one has missed out on proper schooling. But all these ways are more difficult and complicated and it is a hard row to hoe and demands great sacrifice from the student.

The following chart provides a comparison between the educational system in Germany and that in the United States.

German terms used in the chart and their approximate equivalency: occurred in recent years. In spite of that closed character often there are some ways to achieve a higher level of education if one has missed out on proper schooling. But all these ways are more difficult and complicated and it is a hard row to hoe and demands great sacrifice from the student

The following chart provides a comparison between the educational system in Germany and that in the United States.

Since social work training in Germany takes place in the Fachhochschule I would like to make some remarks on that subject.

In my judgement the term Fachhochschule is not transferable to the

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educational system in the United States. Sometimes Fachhochschule is translated as professional college, sometimes as in a governmental publication, it is named polytechnic, and sometimes it is called a specialized institution of higher learning (corresponding approximately to the Technical Colleges of some other countries).

The polytechnics (Fachhochschulen) established since 1970 offer a more practical training on a scientific or artistic basis (chiefly engineering, business management, social work and design) which... will also end with a diploma, which is one of the possible graduations at the universities.

In the system of higher education in Germany there is no distinction between undergraduate and graduate programs though sometimes these terms may appear. But the terms merely distinguish the first part (two years) and the second part (at least another two years) of a regular study course. One does not achieve a degree after the first two years, like the BA, BS, BSW, etc., which exist in the US-system.

3. The Development of Social Work Education. Social work education in Germany has been developed through stages very similar to what has occurred in the United States. The early stage of training was a kind of apprenticeship system, and later on a kind of vocational school where the students were taught how to help the poor, the deprived, the handicapped. In the 50s and 60s professional schooling was further differentiated and complemented by Higher Professional Schools. In 1970 those Higher Professional Schools which fulfilled the then established state and federal requirements were transformed into Fachhochschulen. In the course of this development the requirements for admission were raised and the program extended to four years (including one year of guided field work).

While in the United States . . .social work education encompasses four levels of formal degree program – associate, baccalaureate, masters, and doctoral – as well as programs of continuing education..., in Germany there is only one level which is concluded by a Diploma and there are only a few programs in continuing education.

Generally it can be said that since the inception of the Fachhochschulen German social work education is rather close to the upper division of college education and graduate school education in the United States. What Rosa P. Resnick describes for the United States schools is valid for the schools of social work in Germany too: that is, full-time, theoretical-practical education at the postsecondary or university level, intensive field work in the three basic methods of social work (casework, groupwork, and community organization) with some application of the

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complementary teaching methods (supervision, administration, and consultation), and a thesis for graduation.

As mentioned before, in Germany social work is taught at the Fachhochschulen. In addition some universities offer social welfare programs as one major among others, mainly within the departments of education.

Whether the Fachhochschulen should merge into universities or whether they should keep their independence and autonomy is still a subject of discussion and controversy. Arguments for integration have been chiefly these: There would be possibilities for access to research resources, and therefore social work professionals would be able to do research which is done presently by scientists of related disciplines such as sociology, psychology and political science. There would be an improvement in professional status leading to more political and administrative influence and a step ahead on the way to professionalization.

Arguments for maintaining independence have been these: Smaller units are preferable to the large bureaucratic structures of the universities. There is presently strong emphasis on the practical aspects of social work education and the fear it might be lost in the almost exclusively theoretical environment of the universities.

Social work education as training for a profession embraces knowledge, values and skills. Social work education should lead to professional competence which can be achieved only where instrumental, social and reflexive competence are successfully connected and united. This can be accomplished mainly in an educational environment where emphasis is put on both – theory and proxis. But traditional university departments provide, sometimes exclusively, an education in an abstract and theoretical background in order to train students so as to succeed in research tasks.

Quite a few of my colleagues in social work training in Germany consider social work education at American universities as insufficiently oriented to practical matters and therefore too far away from the client and direct service. On the other hand it is recognized that, also because of the integration of social work education in the scientific climate of the universities in the USA, the profession of social work is much more acknowledged than in Germany.

The professionalization took a faster pace in USA because it was not impeded by other specific qualifications which monopolized administrative positions (in Germany: law degrees and degrees from

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colleges for general public administration) and because scientific manners of public problem solving had prevailed there much earlier.

4. Organization and Curriculum. In Germany two models of social work education have been established at the Fachhochschulen, the so-called two phase model and the one-phase model.

The two-phase model, originally practiced throughout the country has been taken over from the earlier schools, mostly Higher Professional Schools. It means a three-year theoretical education within a Fachhochschule which is called the first phase of the total study course. This is succeded by a one-year field practicum (40 hours a week) within a social welfare institution or agency – the second phase. After a successful completion approved by a commission the student graduates.

The major problem of this model lies in the fact that the theoretical and the practical work in the field tend to remain separate. When the students leave the Fachhochschulen for the practicum they like to consider themselvs much more as beginning professionals than as students who are still in education and just now collecting practical experience. Indeed there is still a connection to the Fachhochschule in the kind of accompanying seminar but this tie is usually weak already at the very beginning and it becomes weaker as time passes. In addition the separation from the Fachhochschule is supported by the fact that the students also get paid about 75% of the usual salary of a social worker during the practicum. The connection to the Fachhochschule loses its value and importance and there is no longer the possibility for sufficient evaluation of the field work experiences within the institutionalized and theorybased frame of the Fachhochschule.

The one-phase model was utilized in Bavaria and BadenWuerttemberg at the time when the Higher Professional Schools were transformed into Fachhochschulen in 1971. It means a four-year training in social work including a one-year guided fieldwork during the third year. Since that field work is integrated into the entire study course this model is called a one-phase education.

At first glance the difference between the two models seems small. But closer analysis will reveal a fundamental difference.

After two years of theoretical studies at the Fachhochschule the students go to work full-time in the field. Though the students are out in the field for 40 hours a week in order to work in direct service as well as in administration they still consider themselves as students who are there primarily to learn for their social work education, and so do faculty and agency staff. There is strong guidance and supervision of the field

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placements by approved social workers. Simultaneously with the field work there are accompanying sessions at the Fachhochschule where the students share their experiences and request theoretical information.

The fourth year is considered by many students to be the most intensive and most important year. After having had a full year of work experience the students are highly motivated to extend their knowledge and skills. They have some experience of the gap between theory and praxis and are eager to bridge it. They know more about their own strengths and weaknesses and are now trying to make up the deficiencies. Finally, they will write their thesis on the basis of their practical experiences in relation to the theory which they have learned.

Though there are many similarities in the social work curricula between the United States and Germany it may help to describe briefly the main issues and point out some of the differences. The next section describes how the curriculum is implemented at the Katholische Stiftungsfachhochschule (KSFH) in Munich. Other schools of social work may differ more or less.

Admission. Admission to a university or Fachhochschule is no longer a major undertaking, except for some disciplines or particular locations and schools. One of these exceptions is to study social work in Munich.

Since the KSFH is a non-state institution we have been able to establish our own admission procedure, of course above and beyond the federal and state requirements. Besides the required grades we give recognition especially to practical experience, whether achieved by working in factories, offices or social service institutions. A written report about the experiences and a personal interview may lead to another plus. In the graph on page 5 I have already shown the different ways to enter higher education. For the Fachhochschule it can be said that students from the Gymnasium have the advantage of being well educated in general subjects (humanities, liberal arts) and are capable of abstract thinking in a high degree, but usually they lack practical experience. Students from the Fachoberschule or the Fachakademie have the advantage of having been introduced already to several social related subjects such as pedagogy, psychology, sociology etc. and have had at least some experience in fieldwork but are usually not so highly trained in abstract thinking. As noted above there is no distinction between undergraduate and graduate programs. Therefore I shall describe the four year social work program year by year.

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First Year. The first year serves die purpose mainly of introduction into the particular fields of social work concerns, into social service institutions and agencies, and into social work methods (case work, group work, community organization) as well as introduction and further development of the social work related disciplines of anthropology and philosophy, law, pedagogy, political science and economics, psychology, social medicine, sociology and statistics and social research. But these disciplines are not taught as they would be inside their own departments but they are linked with the specific subjects: social work, social welfare, social service. For instance, to take an example from sociology: The topic of Social Stratification is not considered only in regard to such issues as how does social stratification appear in this society, how is it measured, and which explanatory theories are there but in addition it will be asked: What impact has this social stratification on social problems? How can knowledge about social stratification help one work effectively as a social worker? How does this knowledge or that theory influence my behavior, my actions as a social worker? Who benefits from the use of a certain theory about social stratification? etc. In brief: What can this discipline contribute to social work?

In the center is the social work profession and all this diverse knowledge has to serve this target. In many ways it is the very same characteristic which Ann Hartman describes for the School of Social Work at the University of Michigan, namely, a characteristic of the school was its strong connection . . . with the academic disciplines, and its major educational mission to integrate knowledge from the social sciences into the profession.

Besides the major subject of social work and the various social science disciplines there are so called practical oriented courses. These courses offer a variety of skills of high value in direct service formany kinds of clients in very different situations. Some examples may illustrate this area: Education in rhythmics, the application of Orff-instruments, sports and folk-dances, art education, poster design, clay work, dramatics, role play, street theatre, the use of media, and others. The major objectives of these classes are to teach how to use skills of these kinds in individual case work as well as in group work or community work. All the subjects and disciplines offered or required during the first year will continue to be taught throughout the four years of study. They will be more specialized in course of time and go more into depth. This is similar again to the curriculum of the School of Social Work at the University of Michigan.

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The first year is rather generic, and in the second year the curriculum moves toward some kind of specialization or concentration.

Second Year. Starting the second year the student has to choose one of five specializations of the social work field:

1.Youth Work, Youth Education, Adult Education.

2.Elementary and Preschool Education, Special Education.

3.Youth Welfare Service, Family Assistance, Help for the Elderly.

4.Resocialization and Rehabilitation.

5.Social Welfare Administration and Social Planning.

Because this very early and strict specialization has led to some disadvantages and sometimes even difficulties in the adjustment to a steadily changing labor market, it will be changed in the very near future. It is the same situation as that described by Hartman in their curriculum building process : The aim was somehow to find a middle ground between a generalist and a specialist education that had some of the advantages of both but the difficulties of neither. On the other hand students would have the opportunity to select a particular focus or concentration around which to deepen their study of interpersonal practice.

Though there will be some changes, a part of the organizational structure will remain, that is, every student will be asked to select a concentration and form a study group with other students of the same focus. The student attends this particular group, which is guided by a faculty member, until the end of the study. According to the selected concentration the student will work in a field placement for half a day per week and will get 2 hours of supervision contact with a faculty member.

Another kind of study group is the project where activities in the field and in the classroom are integrated.

These projects are intended to be problem-oriented, practiceoriented, and inter-disciplinary. Two or more faculty members work together with a group of 12 to 20: students. A project starts with the identifying of a social problem, in the community. Students and faculty members explore the environment, to set up a structure for social service. Social work agencies and social workers serving this particular area are involved to improve already existing services to establish new aids to meet the problem. This is not to say that such a project once initiated cannot be abandoned after the first student group has done its work. It will be handed over every year to the next student group which has selected the same concentration. The students work together as a group in the field as well as in the classroom at least one full day a week. Every student also gets the

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same kind of supervision as mentioned above but by a faculty member who is not involved in that particular project.

This kind of study within a PZU or a project is a major feature of our social work education. It should be considered as a first step in that direction that Ruth Middleman has called pivotal readiness. An emphasis of pivotal anticipatory readiness suggests valuing one who is prepared to move in any direction and who has a generalized, poised concern for such tasks as getting information, communicating, seeking feedback about his impact, keeping options open, looking ahead, living with ambiguity, and realizing in advance that there will be some situations in which he will have to fail. Since the students study and work together in the same group for a long period a great amount of confidence is developed in the group where problems and difficulties, professional as well as personal, where joy, pleasure, and happiness can be shared. This will be supported not only by their common work but also by joint activities during their leisure time, i.e. hiking, skiing, or just being together. The methods learned and used in the projects cover the whole spectrum of case work, group work, or community organization, depending on the particular task.

Some examples of presently existing projects are:

•Working with Handicapped in Haidhausen.

•Social Group Work in Prison.

•Therapeutic Community for Mentally Ill Persons.

•Social Learning and Playing with Children of Foreign Workers.

•Social Work with Foreign Workers in Haidhausen.

Generally, working in a project could be called an ecological approach to the identified social problem. In another terminology it could be referred to as an informal method. As informal methods I mean actions

(1) which are not undertaken according to specific formal schemes, (2) which often mean combinations of a number of different actions, (3) which are mainly carried out in informal situations, i.e. in the field, and (4) which are sometimes, but far from always, initiated by the clients themselves. They are typically initiated by social workers or by other social authorities.

Besides the work in these projects traditional seminars in those disciplines already mentioned above in the first years description are held. Some are related expressly to the projects, some deal with other aspects of social work. A variety of practice oriented courses and seminars in humanities and liberal arts is also offered and the students select according to electives preference.

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Third Year. The third study year is dedicated entirely to field work. Students remaining enrolled at the Fachhochschule now work in the field for 40 weeks that year, 40 hours a week. The Fachhochschule and social work agencies work close together to provide the necessary placements. There, qualified field instructors guide and supervise the students through the different areas of social work.

The practical experiences are accompanied by study days at the Fachhochschule either half a day every other week or as a block of a whole week four times during that year. In those study days the students are together in the same study group (PZU, project) as they were in the year before, even though they might work now in different areas and concentrations. Some of the students continue to work within the projects but now full-time in the field, but most of them will work in the already established social work agencies or social welfare institutions. We have learned that it is very valuable when students can share their different and sometimes their similar experiences within their group. It helped to widen their perspectives on the entire social work spectrum in quite a different manner than just through the point of view of their instructors. While during the proceeding two years the success of the student has been examined and evaluated in each course for itself, during field work it is judged by the field instructor, by a written report of the student and by a colloquium at the end of that year.

Fourth Year. Though the fourth year is considered by many students as most important there is not very much new to say about it which has not been said above. The different disciplines and subjects continue to be taught, now more specific and going more into depth than before. The study group still exists and will continue to deal with the elected concentration as well as the personal development of each student for half a day a week. And there will be now another attitude of the students who are more aware of their scientific needs, their lack of skills, but also their abilities and disabilities. The student will write his/her thesis based upon his/her own practical experiences, advised by a faculty member. Finally, an oral examination is held in which three faculty members and three candidates sit together for two and a half hours dealing with a distinctive case as the basis. Some of these oral examinations leave the status of an exam and turn into a colloquium between experts where there are no more questions and answers but where a mutual exchange of thoughts, arguments, theories and experiences takes place. An external observer would hardly be able to figure out in some cases who are the examiners and

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who are the candidates.

5. Accreditation and Curriculum Building. The accreditation and curriculum building procedure seems to be quite different in Germany and in the United States. I am not going to explicate these differences but only want to delineate a few aspects of the curriculum building process for the schools of social work which took place the last three years in the state of Bavaria in order to improve and adjust the almost ten year old curriculum. It must be said that in Germany all tertiary education at universities and Fachhochschulen is ruled by the Laender (federal states), except in the church facilities. But if a church university or Fachhochschule wants to provide the same degree as a state institution they have to provide the same curriculum, as approved by the state. Of course the curriculum can be enlarged, but not shortened. Though the curriculum is finally set by the state ministry of education there remains some space for conrete implementation. No matter whether a state or a church Fachhochschule, the school itself has to build up its own curriculum structure upon the state regulations. But one question remains: How are the state regulations made?

For the curriculum building process at the state level mentioned above a commission was constituted. The members were not elected somehow but appointed by the ministry of education. The commission consisted of:

8 representatives of the Fachhochschulen (7 faculty members including presidents and deans, 1 student),

3 representatives of state ministries,

5 representatives of social welfare institutions,

2 representatives of professional organizations and unions.

This combination of the representatives shows that the Fachhochschulen themselves have a strong influence in the curriculum building process. However they did not act in concert all the time mainly because of different ideological standpoints. It also shows the weakness of professional organizations and unions of social workers in behalf of their own professional standards in the future.

Ministries and social welfare institutions are rather powerful and they attempted to cut down prior required credit hours of the more critical disciplines like sociology and political science as well as of philosophy in favour of the more pragmatic and adjustive subjects like law and medicine. But through tough and wearisome negotiations the Fachhochschulen could reach an agreeable compromise.

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