ABSTRACT
England’s children’s social care workforce is in a state of crisis, with the problem perhaps more prominent in the field of child protection. This led the Review of Children’s Social Care to call for further evaluation of social work education pathways, particularly in their ability to prepare early career social workers for the rigors of contemporary practice. The study emerged in response to this call, but also in the context of a concurrent narrative emanating from the local Social Work Teaching Partnership, that newly qualified social workers were often found to be ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection work. The study employed an iterative mixed method design to explore the impact of social work qualification route on early career social workers’ sense of preparedness for child protection practice. Whilst some statistical association was found, the study identified areas where social workers generally felt either ‘well’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection work. Moreover, the study presents several strategies for improving the preparation of early career social workers for child protection practice, including cultivating partnerships with specialist child protection organizations; interprofessional teaching and learning across suitable programmes; better collaboration with ‘experts-by-experience’ in the delivery of content; and designed field trips to child protection settings.
Introduction
International literature continues to examine the role of social work education in preparing newly qualifying social workers for the rigors of contemporary practice (e.g. Chang-Muy & Congress, Citation2023; Pryor et al., Citation2023; Renner & Driessen, Citation2023), especially in the context of workforce stability (e.g. Hitchcock et al., Citation2021, Citation2023; Ravalier et al., Citation2022), and with child welfare settings a particular area of focus (e.g. Nilsen et al., Citation2023; Russ et al., Citation2022; Sobeck et al., Citation2023; Trujillo et al., Citation2020).
Like other western countries (e.g. Hitchcock et al., Citation2023; Ravalier et al., Citation2022; Sobeck et al., Citation2023), the United Kingdom’s social work workforce is in a state of crisis—characterized by huge sickness and agency rates, unfilled vacancies, and record numbers of practitioners resigning from the profession (Department for Education DfE, Citation2023a, Citation2023b). This is aligned to a growing dissatisfaction within the role (Ravalier, Citation2019) with estimates that, in some areas, a quarter of the workforce plan to leave social work within the next year, and nearly half within the next five years (Social Care Wales, Citation2023).
However, in England the problem is particularly apparent, with children’s social care being a case in point (MacAlister, Citation2022). Here, practitioners continue to express concerns about working conditions (Murphy, Citation2022a, Citation2022b; Ravalier, Citation2023); their inability to spend satisfactory time with children (McLaughlin et al., Citation2022; Murphy, Citation2021a, Citation2021b); the poor ‘work–life balance’ (Murphy, Citation2023; Murphy et al., Citation2024); and other specific ‘personal costs’ associated with the role (Murphy, Citation2023; Murphy et al., Citation2024). These factors continue to be linked to a 22% vacancy rate (7,900); agency staff making up nearly 18% of the children’s social worker workforce (6,800); and a 40% increase in social workers leaving the profession since 2016–17 (5,400) (Department for Education DfE, Citation2023a; Murphy, Citation2024).
It is in this context that the recent ‘Review of Children’s Social Care’ suggested a myriad of reform—with the ostensive aim of improving the stability of the children’s social worker workforce, and with the field of child protection being an area of particular priority (see MacAlister, Citation2022). Many of the proposed reforms sought to target the ‘symptoms’ of workforce instability (e.g. high agency rates and poor-quality of relationships with children). However, there was also a focus on the purported causes of instability—not least a call for further evaluation of the contrasting social work education pathways and their effectiveness in preparing ‘early career’ social workers for the rigors of contemporary practice (MacAlister, Citation2022).
This study emerged directly in response to this call. However, it also took place in the context of a lingering narrative within the Cheshire and Merseyside Social Work Teaching Partnership (CMSWTP) that ‘early career’ social workers were increasingly deciding to leave child protection roles within their first year(s) of practice, based on repeated accounts of ‘burnout’ and being ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection work (see also Carpenter et al., Citation2012; MacAlister, Citation2022; McLaughlin et al., Citation2022; Murphy et al., Citation2024).
The study draws directly from the experiences of 201 ‘early career’ social workers (i.e. ‘those with less than 5 years’ experience’ – MacAlister, Citation2022, p. 185) in practice across England, to consider the impact of social work education qualifying route on ‘preparedness for child protection practice’. In doing so, the paper identifies an association between route/type of qualification and social workers’ sense of being ‘well-prepared’ for specific child protection activities. However, it also identifies areas where the social workers reported a general feeling of being either ‘well’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection practice, irrespective of route/type of qualification. Moreover, the paper highlights several broad strategies for improving the preparation of newly qualified/early career social workers for the realities, and challenges, of contemporary child protection social work.
Throughout the discussion that follows, reference will be made to different social work education pathways available in England. To facilitate the reader’s understanding of these, and for context, the different features of these pathways are set out in ‘’.
Table 1. Social work education pathways by comparison.
Materials and Methods
This study was funded by the National Institute of Health and Care Research, with money awarded through the Cheshire and Merseyside Social Work Teaching Partnership. The research team comprised partly of academic staff—namely a senior social work academic and senior research academic (specializing in quantitative data analysis)—but also three final year undergraduate social work students (each of whom have subsequently secured employment on a statutory child protection team). The design recognized the advantages that student practitioners often bring to a research study, especially when they have a particular ‘stake’ in the area being investigated; and the importance, and benefit, of introducing social workers to research endeavors early in their career, given the correlation between many ‘research’ and ‘social work’ tasks (Buck et al., Citation2023). The students who comprised part of the research team had studied on an undergraduate research module immediately prior to undertaking the research project and received additional training in respect to qualitative data collection and analysis. They contributed to all parts of the study, including the preparation of dissemination materials.
The research sought to explore early career social workers experiences of child protection, including their assessment of how their social work education had prepared them (or otherwise) for contemporary practice. Moreover, to ascertain the impact of qualification type/route, and areas that they considered needed more focussed attention in the design of social work education curriculum/programmes. On this basis, the study posed three specific research questions:
In what way does social work qualification type/route inform the social workers’ sense of preparedness for child protection practice?
What are the areas in which early career social workers feel either ‘well-prepared’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection practice?
What are the messages and implications for those designing social work education curriculum/programmes?
The study received ethical approval from Edge Hill University’s Health-related Research Ethics Committee (reference ETH2122–0267); and endorsement by both the Association of Child Protection Professionals (AoCPP) (reference EHUCM0223), and the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) (reference RGE220824). It adhered to internationally accepted ethical guidelines and both Social Work England and the British Association of Social Workers ethical standards. Formal data collection took place between October 2022 and August 2023.
The research encompassed an iterative mixed method design, comprising focus groups, an online questionnaire, and individual interviews. Recruitment took place separately for each phase of the data collection, by sharing letters of invitation via the CMSWTP, ADCS, and AoCPP networks, as well as by posting adverts on various social media platforms (i.e. Twitter and LinkedIn). For the purposes of the focus groups and interviews, practitioners interested in participating were asked to contact the research lead via e-mail. However, the questionnaire could be accessed directly via a URL link contained within the letter of invitation. In order to participate, each candidate was asked to confirm that they were a practicing social worker with a minimum of 1 year, but maximum of five years post-qualification experience (i.e. ‘early career’), and were employed on some iteration of a local authority child protection team (e.g. ‘Assessment’; ‘Safeguarding’; ‘Court’)—the questionnaire could not be accessed unless candidates responded in the affirmative to these questions on the first page of the survey.
The first stage of data collection comprised of 3 virtual focus groups (hosted on the Microsoft Teams platform). It sought to identify different child protection tasks/activities where participants felt that they had been either ‘well’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for contemporary practice, with the aim of informing the content of the second stage of data collection. Analysis of the focus group data identified 52 key child protection tasks/activities (see Appendix 1)—each of which was incorporated into the second stage of data collection, an online questionnaire.
The questionnaire was hosted on the JISC Online Surveys Platform (this is a digital tool used widely in UK research and academia—allowing for ‘creation, distribution, and the analysis of surveys’ – see JISC, Citation2023). Its remit was to explore the extent to which the findings of the focus groups were representative of a wider social work demographic. The questionnaire asked respondents to identify their type/route of social work qualification (i.e. ‘BA/BSc in Social Work’; ‘MA/MSc in Social Work’; ‘PGDip-Step Up to Social Work’; etc) and to rate on a 5-point Likert scale the extent to which they felt that their social work education had prepared them for the 52 different child protection tasks/activities. The survey also included open questions pertaining to the research aims of the study (e.g. ‘What are the areas in which you feel “well-prepared” for child protection practice?’ – see above).
The data from the questionnaire was analyzed using both quantitative data analysis (i.e. Chi-square tests) and qualitative data analysis (i.e. Grounded Theory Method—see Charmaz, Citation2014), and the findings were used to inform the questions for the individual interviews in the third stage of data collection. The interviews were again hosted online using the Microsoft Teams platform. They were analyzed using Grounded Theory Method. Their purpose was to provide greater depth and context to the findings emerging from both the focus groups and questionnaire.
In total, 201 practicing child protection social workers from 79 of England’s local authorities, took part in this study—with 9 practitioners participating in multiple stages of data collection (i.e. questionnaire and interview—see ‘’).
Table 2. Number of participants per data collection stage.
At the time of participation, the group had been qualified for a mean of 2 years and 4 months and had worked as a child protection social worker for a similar length of time. Their age ranged from 21 to 56 years old; 92% (n185) identified that their first language was ‘English’; 72% (n145) identified as ‘White British’; and 89% (n179) identified as ‘female’. Furthermore, 44% of participants (n89) had qualified from a ‘traditional’ undergraduate university-based programme (i.e. BA/BSc Social Work); 26% (n52) from a ‘traditional’ postgraduate university-based programme (i.e. MA/MSc Social Work); 13% (n26) via the ‘Step-Up to Social Work’ route; 12% (n24) via the ‘Frontline’ provider; and 6% (n10) from some ‘other’ form of qualifying programme (including six graduates of the social work apprenticeship).
Findings
The association between qualification type/route and sense of preparedness for child protection tasks
One of the main purposes of the research questionnaire was to examine the association between the social workers’ sense of preparedness for the 52 child protection tasks/activities identified in the focus groups and their route/type of qualification. The Chi-square tests showed no statistical significance between qualifying type/route and the social workers’ sense of preparedness for 41 of the 52 child protection tasks/activities considered. However, a significant association was recorded for 11 of these tasks/activities, where the social workers graduating from either the ‘Step-Up to Social Work’ (SUSW) or ‘MA/MSc Social Work’ programme were more likely to record that they were ‘somewhat well prepared’ for the specific task. These tasks, the associated course, and the p-values, can be seen in .
Table 3. Child protection tasks where there was a significant association with participants feeling ‘somewhat well prepared’.
However, the tests recorded no statistical advantage for those qualifying through the BA/BSc, ‘Frontline’, or ‘other’ social work education routes in respect to any of the 52 tasks/activities considered.
The importance of institution/provider over qualification type/route
Consistently apparent within the practitioners’ qualitative accounts, was their sense that the individual approach of the institution/provider responsible for delivering the social work qualification, had more of an influence on the social workers’ sense of preparedness for child protection practice, than the qualification type/route itself. This was evidenced in several examples of social workers who had gained the same qualification, but via different institutions/providers, relaying contrasting experiences of their social work education:
One thing I was disappointed about with the Step-Up [to Social Work] course is that we didn’t have more time practicing being cross-examined for the Court. (SW2-Interview)
If I had to choose one thing about Step-Up that really helped me prepare … I would say, all the practice for giving evidence in Court – it was a point of emphasis in the teaching …. (SW17-Interview)
However, there were also accounts of social workers who had studied the same qualification at the same institution, but via different student cohorts, who also provided contrasting reflections of how well the programme had, or had not, prepared them for child protection practice:
I loved the mock court room session where we got to learn about Family Court work. (SW1- Focus Group 3)
That’s strange because I did that course at [the same] University, but we didn’t have that session … when did you qualify? (SW4- Focus Group 3)
2019. (SW1- Focus Group 3)
Yeah, I was 2018, but we didn’t have that session. (SW4- Focus Group 3)
These accounts suggest subtle differences in the delivery of social work courses, including when the programme of study took place at the same institution, and thus, ostensibly followed the same structure and curriculum for different student cohorts. Moreover, that the social workers’ evaluation of how well (or otherwise) their social work education had prepared them for the rigors of child protection practice, was informed by their individual assessment of their social work education programme. This point was further evidenced by specific accounts of social workers who had seemingly studied as part of the same student cohort, but who gave contrasting reflections as to the effectiveness of their social work education to prepare them for child protection practice:
… there was too much time spent studying social work theory, and not enough time on practical tasks. (SW1- Focus Group 4)
That’s funny, because [REDACTED] and I actually studied on the same course, and that wasn’t my experience – yes, perhaps I would have liked more practical days, but not at the expense of the theory sessions, I found them really useful [laughs]. (SW2- Focus Group 4)
These differences are important to note, and perhaps suggest a degree of futility in trying to ascertain the effectiveness of one social work education route/type over another in the context of ‘preparedness for child protection’ – a point returned to in the discussion section of this paper. However, this notwithstanding, the research findings also highlighted a series of general tendencies amongst the social workers to report being either ‘well-prepared’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for specific areas of contemporary child protection practice, irrespective of qualification route/type or institution/provider. These areas are highlighted in the section that follows.
Areas where social workers generally felt ‘well’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection practice
Analysis of the questionnaire data highlighted five broad tasks/activities where the social workers generally felt that they had been ‘well-prepared’ for contemporary child protection practice, and 12 tasks/activities where the social workers generally felt that they had been ‘ill-prepared’ for contemporary child protection. The data in relation to these is set out in ‘’.
Table 4. Areas where social workers generally felt ‘well’ or ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection practice.
It is also significant that these tendencies carried over to the social workers’ anecdotal accounts obtained during the focus groups and interviews. For example, in terms of being ‘well-prepared’ for child protection practice:
Studying at Uni[versity] means you have to learn how to write assignments and how important it is to include theory and research throughout your writing … [It] got me into good habits. (SW15-Interview)
But also, in respect to being ‘ill-prepared’ for child protection practice:
I wish my course had helped me prepare for … the threats … the stress … covering for sick colleagues, all the extra unpaid work we do …. (SW3-Focus Group 4)
… But it’s a difficult balance, isn’t it? … you want to inform students of the challenges that they will encounter, but you don’t want to put them off taking up those roles. (SW1-Focus Group 4)
As intimated in this last exchange, there was particular recognition amongst practitioners of the challenge faced by social work education providers of needing to simultaneously elucidate the ‘difficult realities’ associated with child protection (in the interests of preparing students for those realities), but without concurrently dissuading practitioners from taking up child protection posts once qualified. Indeed, this was something that the social workers accepted was a ‘difficult balance’ to achieve, but which they strongly felt needed better addressing within social work education generally—especially in the context of reducing staff sickness and burnout amongst early career child protection social workers:
Yes, but until newly qualified social workers have a better understanding of the challenges they will face, you will continue to have people burning out quickly. (SW3-Focus Group 4)
Messages and implications for those designing social work curriculum and programmes
In responding to questions about how social work curriculum/education programmes could be improved to better prepare early career practitioners for the rigors of contemporary child protection, the social workers tended to highlight the need for additional taught content, often in relation to the practical tasks identified in —for example, ‘we need teaching sessions that help us prepare to give evidence in Court’ (SW21-Questionnaire), or ‘more focus on how to manage the amount of paperwork we do’ (SW3-Focus Group 2). However, these practical tasks aside, the social workers identified a series of broad strategies, which they felt could be more widely adopted throughout social work education. The first of these pertained to ‘expanding partnerships’ with external agencies:
We need to better align what is taught with the knowledge and expertise of specialist child protection organisations because they have a unique understanding of what is going on at the frontline and what social workers need to know to prepare for that. (SW139-Questionnaire)
Indeed, several of the social workers highlighted examples of where their social work education institution/provider had sought to procure the services of an external agency, so as to diversify and enhance the pedagogical portfolio offered. This included the use of drama and ‘theater companies’:
On my course, they employed the Geese Theatre Company … there was loads of child protection content … it was engaging and enjoyable and the feedback was really positive. (SW14-Interview)
Moreover, many of the cited examples included accounts of partnership with specialist child protection charities, where social workers reflected on the benefits of ‘unusual’ or else ‘unique’ learning opportunities:
On our specialist children’s module, the[y] arranged for us to attend a seminar hosted by the Association of Child Protection [Professionals] … it was fantastic, a unique session … [that] helped me to prepare for[contemporary practice]. (SW21-Interview)
The second strategy pertained to increased use of inter-professional or else ‘joint’ teaching across relevant programmes, which social workers considered beneficial in terms of understanding the challenges of multi-agency/inter-professional working, especially in a child protection context:
Our course had a big focus on how we could work with other student practitioners – like police officers, nurses, GPs, midwives – so that we could understand their mindset and their approach to child protection … and the barriers that this can create. (SW3-Interview)
Oftentimes, this took the form of simulation in the sense of a ‘mock’ child protection conference, a child medical, and/or an assessment:
We did a load of multi-professional learning with the other programmes in the faculty, for example … a pretend home visit with a student police officer … [and] being cross-examined as if we were giving evidence in the Court … it was great to act out what we would later do in real life, especially with our future colleagues. (SW87-Questionnaire)
As intimated in the last account, this ‘multi-professional learning’ tended to include the use of specialist teaching rooms and equipment, such as a court room, a fictional service user’s home, or a hospital ward:
I liked the use of the specialist teaching facilities that we had at our university. There was a simulation suite that could be changed to suit the needs of the situation … I remember doing a practice assessment with a student midwife in a flat and then later a practice child protection medical with a GP in a hospital ward. (SW21-Interview)
Significantly, the social workers repeatedly reflected that this type of learning endeavor had helped better narrow the ‘theory-practice divide’ (Hicks, Citation2016, p. 400), in the sense that the learning moved beyond the usual ‘reading’, ‘listening, and ‘thinking’ that most associated with ‘traditional’ classroom settings:
I loved the inter-agency practice stuff … it really helped you put yourself in that position of being a social worker and working with other professionals and what that’s like …. (SW4-Focus Group 3)
Yeah, we did that too, I mean you can only do so much sitting in class listening to lecturers talk about the challenges of working with other professionals, but then you get to act that out, and start to understand the different ways of thinking when we are doing safeguarding work. (SW1-Focus Group 3)
Indeed, the third strategy identified, pertained to other endeavors aimed at narrowing the ‘theory-practice divide’, including those which either sought to incorporate people with lived experience of child protection, or else, would enable students to visit ‘real-world’ child protection settings. For example, the social workers called for better inclusion of service users who had experience of the child protection system:
Lots of courses include service users for different things, but I think sometimes it feels a bit tokenistic, as they tend to be limited to either carers or adults with disabilities…Whilst those inputs are valuable, they don’t really help you understand the different aspects of child protection … I think it would be really useful to involve service users who have actually been through the [child protection] system, as they can offer that unique perspective. (SW14-Interview)
Also, they suggested the need for better use of practicing child protection social workers in the delivery of taught content, on the basis that they were perceived to have a greater degree of ‘credibility’ over ‘traditional’ academics, given a continued proximity to frontline child protection practice:
My university employed two ‘lecturer-practitioners’ … They were basically child protection social workers half of the week, and lecturers the other half … you just felt that they spoke with more authority about the system and what was going on, because they were still doing the job on that day-to-day basis. (SW8-Interview)
Finally, the social workers advocated for increased opportunities for field trips and visits to child protection settings, which they felt served a particular purpose of removing some of the anxiety associated with different child protection tasks and practice scenarios:
The best thing we did on my course was go on a visit to the local court … we were taken around by an actual Judge, looked in the court room and practiced standing in the witness box … it just took that fear away really … and when I got my first court case, I wasn’t as worried because I’d been there before, and talked to a Judge who explained that they were just human like the rest of us [laughs]. (SW2-Focus Group 4)
Discussion
Social work literature continues to detail the state of crisis facing England’s children’s social care workforce (e.g. Department for Education (DfE), Citation2023a, Citation2023b; MacAlister, Citation2022; McLaughlin et al., Citation2022; Murphy, Citation2023, Citation2024; Murphy et al., Citation2024; Ravalier, Citation2023; Unison, Citation2022). This recently led the Review of Children’s Social Care to propose a myriad of reform aimed at improving the stability of the workforce in the interests of the children and families in receipt of statutory services (see MacAlister, Citation2022). Many of the suggested reforms seek to target the ‘symptoms’ of workforce instability (i.e. high agency rates and poor-quality relationships with children and families). However, there was also a call for further appraisal of social work education pathways—especially ‘traditional university based social work courses’ (MacAlister, Citation2022: 186Footnote1)—in the context of their ability to prepare ‘early career’ practitioners for the rigors of contemporary children’s social work.
Of course, recent history is replete with similar calls (e.g. Croisdale-Appleby, Citation2014; Narey, Citation2014), which have led to multiple evaluations of the different education pathways and their ability to train and retain ‘newly qualified’ social workers within England’s children’s social care setting (e.g. Baginsky & Manthorpe, Citation2016; Carpenter et al., Citation2012; Hussein et al., Citation2014; Johnson et al., Citation2022; Smith et al., Citation2018; Wilson & Kelly, Citation2010). However, few studies have focussed specifically on preparedness for child protection practice, despite longstanding concerns about the ability of social work education programmes to ready practitioners for the specific challenges associated with this type of work (Laming, Citation2003; MacAlister, Citation2022; Munro, Citation2011). Therefore, the findings of this study are timely in seeking to address this knowledge gap.
Firstly, the study sought to explore the influence of the social workers’ qualification type/route on their sense of preparedness for practice. Statistical analysis found a significant association between route/type of qualification and 11 child protection tasks/activities. The association especially favored those who had qualified through the ‘Step-Up to Social Work’, and to a lesser extent, the ‘MA/MSc Social Work’ routes. It is significant that the latter of these is considered a ‘traditional university based social work course’, but also, that no statistical advantage was identified for those qualifying through the BA/BSc, ‘Frontline’, or ‘other’ social work education programmes. This is in the context of the Review of Children’s Social Care’s call to further appraise ‘traditional university based social work courses’, but also in that FastTrack courses like ‘Frontline’ have previously been identified as offering better general preparation for children’s social work (i.e. not child protection specifically) over ‘traditional university based social work courses’ (see Johnson et al., Citation2022).
However, in their qualitative accounts the social workers consistently expressed the belief that it was the individual approach of the institution/provider delivering the social work course which held most influence on their sense of preparedness for child protection practice. The study identified different accounts in which social workers who had studied through the same qualifying route, but via different institutions, provided contrasting opinions as to the effectiveness of that route/qualification in preparing them for child protection. Moreover, accounts in which practitioners had studied the same social work qualification programme at the same institution, and either via different or the same student cohort, but who still provided contrasting positions as to the effectiveness of that programme in preparing them for child protection practice.
The difference in these accounts can perhaps be explained by the specific needs of the local stakeholders involved in the design of social work curriculum in different parts of the country (with the taught content of individual Step-Up to Social Work programmes for example, being at least partly informed by the requirements of the sponsoring local authorities—see Smith et al., Citation2018). However, the findings suggest that any notion that one qualification type/route is more effective at preparing early career social workers for child protection practice is perhaps reductionist, given that it ostensibly fails to accommodate the individual factors that can impact upon the social worker’s experience of their social work education (see Hussein et al., Citation2014; Wilson & Kelly, Citation2010). For example, the impact of a particularly passionate and inspiring lecturer/trainer; novel modes of delivery; and the learning style/preferences of the specific student—each of which were cited during this study. Furthermore, it fails to account for the different child protection experiences and challenges, and the other organizational factors, that the individual social worker encounters once qualified (see also Hussein et al., Citation2014). For example, contrasting caseload demands; instances of targeted threats and abuse; and a supportive, or non-supportive manager/supervisor (see also, Murphy, Citation2021a, Citation2021b; Murphy, Citation2022a, Citation2022c, Citation2023; Murphy et al., Citation2024; Jansen, Citation2018)—again, cited during this study.
That being said, this research identified a series of child protection tasks/activities, for which the social workers expressed a general feeling of being ‘well-prepared’ for child protection practice. For example, when ‘integrating social work theory and research into practice’; ‘identifying and assessing risk’; undertaking ‘direct work with children’; and ‘writing assessments’. This is significant in that it indicates progress in relation to previous concerns about England’s social work education—not least the requisite assessment, written, and risk-management skills needed for child protection practice (e.g. Baginsky & Manthorpe, Citation2016; Munro, Citation2011).
In contrast, the social workers expressed a general feeling of being ‘ill-prepared’ for other practical tasks (especially pertaining to ‘court work’); and in terms of managing competing time demands, burdensome bureaucracy, and the high level of ‘paperwork’ involved in child protection. Moreover, the social workers generally felt that their social work education had not prepared them for many of the specific challenges perceived to be inherent within child protection practice. These included being ‘targeted for threats and/or intimidation’; ‘pressure to work over contracted hours’; the ‘emotional toll’ of the work; and managing other workforce factors such as ‘high staff sickness’ levels and vacancy rates. The significance here is that many of these factors have been identified as underpinning instability within England’s children’s social care workforce (e.g. British Association of Social Workers (BASW), Citation2023; Murphy, Citation2023; Murphy et al., Citation2024; Ravalier, Citation2023; Unison, Citation2022), and these findings perhaps provide further insight into why some early career child protection social workers are choosing to leave the profession in the first year(s) of their practice (see also McLaughlin et al., Citation2022; Murphy, Citation2024; Murphy et al., Citation2024).
Strategies for enhancing preparedness for child protection practice
Helpfully, in the context of this research, the social workers identified a series of strategies which they felt could be more broadly adopted by social work education providers, on the basis of better preparing early career social workers for the specific challenges and tasks associated with child protection. The first of these pertained to ‘expanding partnerships’ with external agencies—with several of the participating social workers highlighting examples of where their educational institution/provider had sought to procure the services of an external organization, so as to diversify and enhance the pedagogical portfolio offered. This included the use of bespoke drama and theater companies, and partnership with specialist child protection charities—whose expertise was said to lead to ‘unusual’ or else ‘unique’ learning opportunities, and therefore enhance students’ sense of both satisfaction with the course and preparedness for child protection practice.
There is an increasing sense of ‘partnership’ within England’s social work education generally, perhaps best exemplified by the introduction of ‘Teaching Partnerships’ throughout the last decade—whose benefits have been linked with improved access to, and quality of, student placements; and enhanced curriculum relevant to the social work workplace (Department for Education DfE, Citation2020). There is also recognition of the benefit of embedding ‘arts-based’ content in social work education programmes (see Leonard et al., Citation2018). However, there has been less consideration of the benefits of partnership between social work educators and specialist child protection charities. Yet, there are increasing examples of these partnerships throughout the country, often taking the form of a ‘Memorandum of Understanding’ (e.g. Association of Child Protection Professionals (AoCPP), Citation2023) and citing the organizations’ joint commitment to ‘improving the skills and knowledge of those working in child protection’ (e.g. Edge Hill University, Citation2023). Whilst many of these remain in their infancy and therefore, lack evaluation as to their effectiveness in the context of enhancing the training and retention of early career social workers (Ravalier, Citation2023), their purported aims consistently align with the emphasis placed on improving practitioners’ preparedness for contemporary child protection (e.g. Department for Education (DfE), Citation2023b; MacAlister, Citation2022; Munro, Citation2011). Moreover, the multi-agency nature of many of the external organizations involved, also suggests potential for extending the features of the partnership to students of other relevant programmes of study—especially those who will likely go on to work in a child protection context (e.g. police officers, nurses, midwives, psychologists, etc).
Relatedly, the second strategy pertained to the increased use of inter-professional or else ‘joint’ teaching across relevant programmes, which social workers considered particularly beneficial in terms of understanding the challenges of multi-agency/inter-professional working in child protection. This was said to make use of ‘role-play’ and simulation in respect to child protection tasks (see also Kourgiantakis & Lee, Citation2022; Wilson & Kelly, Citation2010)—including through the use of specialist teaching facilities and equipment (e.g. a ‘mock’ court room; flat; or hospital ward). Significantly, the social workers championed these endeavors in the context of narrowing the ‘theory-practice divide’; offering the students a more diverse learning experience; and enhancing their level of satisfaction with their social work course and their sense of preparedness for child protection work. The importance of this finding is that it adds to the growing understanding of the benefits of embedding different forms of ‘multi-professional learning’ throughout social work (and related) education programmes—particularly in the context of improving preparation for child protection practice amongst practitioners from different professional backgrounds.
The third strategy pertained to other concerted efforts by social work education providers to bridge the gap between ‘practice’ and the classroom. For example, whilst the importance and benefits of learning through children’s social work practice placements has long been established (e.g. Baginsky & Manthorpe, Citation2016; Munro, Citation2011), the social workers of this study also highlighted the positive impact of field trips to specific child protection settings (i.e. the local Family Court; Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub; and hospital wards). Moreover, the benefits of ensuring that current practitioners and service users of the child protection system were involved in the design and delivery of taught content (see also Smith, Citation2013; Wilson & Kelly, Citation2010).
There are, of course, distinct ethical challenges in respect to involving child protection service users in the delivery of social work education (i.e. these are highly vulnerable groups who can often be perceived as involuntary service users—see Ferguson, Citation2011; Smith, Citation2013). However, the evidence from this study suggests that particular education providers are successfully embedding the ‘unique perspective’ of these ‘experts-by-experience’ (Fox, Citation2016, p. 961; Citation2022) in the delivery of taught content. This therefore, suggests that there is opportunity to learn from and expand upon these endeavors, in the interests of giving enhanced focus to the perspective of those on the receiving end of England’s child protection services, with the aim of better preparing newly qualifying practitioners to work within the system, but also, the service users’ experiences of it (i.e. by reducing workforce instability and thus, enhancing the quality of relationships—see MacAlister, Citation2022).
Implications
Several implications emerge from the findings of this study. Firstly, the importance of acknowledging the subtle differences that exist in the delivery of social work education programmes across the country, both between and within institutions/providers (including different experiences when studying on the same programme as part of a different, or the same, year group)—a point often omitted in previous evaluations of social work education. Moreover, that there is an inevitable degree of subjectivity involved in any individual appraisal of the effectiveness of social work education pathways—and which is invariably informed by the specific requirements and experiences of the appraising practitioner.
Secondly, that social work education providers in England may need to better embed different strategies for preparing student social workers for the distinct features of child protection work, or else, risk prolonging the problem of able practitioners withdrawing from child protection after only a short period of professional practice (see also BASW, Citation2023; Murphy, Citation2023, Citation2024; Unison, Citation2022). That is not to say that this responsibility falls squarely within the remit of social work education providers—as policymakers and employing organizations must take a more assertive role in addressing this issue (Murphy et al., Citation2024). However, the participants of this study consistently asserted that social work education providers must adopt a greater degree of ‘transparency’ in respect to the challenges that qualifying social workers are likely to face when embarking on a career in child protection.
Furthermore, there is a need for those providers who also offer training in related professional programmes (e.g. nursing, midwifery, policing, medicine, probation, etc) to expand endeavors to embed inter-programme teaching and learning in the interests of better preparing qualifying practitioners from a range of disciplines for contemporary child protection.
There is also the requirement for increased enquiry into how social work education providers can better embed the expertise of those with the lived experience of the child protection system in the delivery of their courses (including through the use of ‘lecturer-practitioners’), and expand the use of planned field visits to child protection settings—albeit in a way that neither unnecessarily intrudes into the lives of those receiving child protection services, nor disrupts the work of those delivering those services.
Concluding thoughts
There is, of course, an argument that only the most experienced social workers should undertake complex child protection work (akin to the expectations around adult mental health tasks which often require additional specialist social work qualifications). Indeed, in this regard, the recent Review of Children’s Social Care has proposed the introduction of ‘Expert Child Protection Practitioners’ (MacAlister, Citation2022, p. 9), who, ‘as [the most] experienced social workers’ would assume ‘responsibility for making key decisions’ in a child protection context (p.9). Yet, both the Review and the UK Government’s subsequent reform strategy ‘Stable Homes Built on Love’ (Department for Education DfE, Citation2023b), seemingly accept that the current level of workforce instability seen within the English child protection system, means that child protection social work will invariably be forced to rely on newly qualified and ‘early career’ practitioners for the foreseeable future (Murphy et al., Citation2024). In this regard, it is hoped that the findings of this study will lead to improved endeavors amongst social work education providers to help better prepare these practitioners for the specific challenges associated with child protection work (see Murphy et al., Citation2024).
The study has explored the impact of social work education route/type on ‘early career’ social workers’ sense of preparedness for child protection practice. Whilst the study draws from the experiences of 201 current child protection social workers practicing in England, a limitation pertains to the uneven representation of different social work qualification routes considered (i.e. >70% of participants having studied via ‘traditional university based social work courses’)—with the relatively new ‘Social Work Apprenticeship’ (see Stone & Worsley, Citation2022) particularly poorly represented. Moreover, this remains a small sample, when we consider that there are nearly 32,000 ‘child and family social workers’ in post in England at this current time (Department for Education DfE, Citation2023a)—although there is a lack of clarity on how many of these are employed on child protection teams. Indeed, there remains an argument for extending the study on this basis, whilst also seeking to better include the testimonies of other relevant stakeholders (i.e. social work educators/academics; employers; and those in receipt of child protection services).
Furthermore, whilst the remit of this study has been on how education pathways impact upon social workers sense of preparedness for child protection practice, it is also important to acknowledge the essential role that practice placements, employers, and indeed Social Work Teaching Partnerships play in enhancing practitioners’ sense of preparedness for child protection—both during and indeed, after completion of their formal social work education. On this basis, future studies may also seek to explore how practice agencies, employers and local Social Work Teaching Partnerships can better help early career social workers to develop and thrive in child protection practice. Finally, it is important to acknowledge the limitations associated with participants self-ranking in respect to their sense of preparedness for child protection practice—e.g. that it can be impacted by poor self-awareness; exaggeration and/or minimization; and that an estimation given at a single point of time, fails to account for the potential for change over time (Razavi, Citation2001).
Nevertheless, this study provides an important contribution to the knowledge area as it pertains to the impact of social work education on social workers’ sense of preparedness for child protection. It highlights a trend for early career social workers to feel generally ill-prepared for several of the features of child protection work, including those previously highlighted as underpinning workforce instability within England’s children’s social care. Moreover, it reflects on the difficult balance of social work programmes seeking to better inform and prepare student social workers for the realities and challenges associated with contemporary child protection, without concurrently dissuading them from taking up a child protection post once qualified.
Again, the social workers of this study explicitly called for greater ‘transparency’ on social work education programmes with respect to the ‘negative features’ of child protection work, in the interests of reducing the amount of staff sickness and burnout encountered by early career child protection social workers. Moreover, the practitioners identified a series of strategies that they felt could be adopted more broadly throughout social work education, as a means of better illuminating these challenges; narrowing the ‘theory-practice’ divide; and thus, optimizing the preparation of early career social workers for the realities of child protection work.
The findings of this study provide England’s social work programmes with a further opportunity to reconsider their practices in the context of preparedness for child protection, enhancing their practice as necessary, and in the interest of all stakeholders—not least the vulnerable children in receipt of child protection services.
Disclosure statement
Dr Ciaran Murphy is a Trustee of the Association of Child Protection Professionals.
Additional information
Funding
Notes
1. It is important to note that MacAlister’s comments here (and indeed his appointment as Chair of the Review of Children’s Social Care) are considered controversial given his role in setting up ‘Frontline’ as a direct competitor to ‘traditional university based social work courses’.
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Appendix 1
The questionnaire asked participants to rate how well their social work education had prepared them for the rigours of child protection practice on a 5-part Likert scale of
a. Extremely ill-prepared; b. Somewhat ill-prepared; c. Neutral - Nether ’ill-prepared’ nor ’well-prepared’; d. Somewhat well-prepared; e. Extremely well-prepared
Against the following 52 child protection practice areas/activities:
Producing written evidence for court
Providing verbal evidence in court
Being cross-examined in court
‘Advocates meetings’
Arranging meetings
Chairing meetings
Delegating work to other stakeholders (including parents, family members, other professionals)
Identifying and assessing risk
Managing risk
Writing case notes
Writing assessments
Working with resistant service users
Working with resistant professionals
Managing conflict
‘The challenges of multi-agency working’
Direct work with children
Direct work with parents/carers
The need to ask difficult questions (‘polite scepticism’)
Working with children across different ages
Working with different categories of abuse
‘Cold-calling’ (including telephone calls and doorstep visits)
Financial pressures (‘limited available financial resources’)
Caseload pressures (‘high caseloads’)
‘The mismatch between demand for services and available resources’
Other organisational challenges (i.e. high staff sickness and vacancy rates)
Dealing with unexpected/unanticipated situations
Having to challenge parents/carers
Having to challenge other professionals
Managing competing time demands (diary management)
Completing referrals for other services
The ‘bureaucratic burden’/‘amount paperwork’
Using organisational recording systems (i.e. Liquid Logic)
Communicating sad/upsetting news to children/family members
Receiving sad/upsetting news/disclosures from children/family members
Preparing conference reports
Strategy discussions
‘Section 47’ investigations
Being the recipient of threats and/or intimidation
Encountering negative attitudes/stigma about social workers
Pressures to work over contracted hours
Pressures to ‘take work home’/work in the evenings and at weekends
Balancing work and personal/family life
‘Removing children under challenging circumstances’
‘The emotional toll’
Managing others’ emotions
Managing others’ expectations
The social issues encountered (e.g. poverty)
Child protection terminology
Child protection processes
Integrating social work theory and research into practice
Searching for and identifying research, theory and other academic sources to use in assessments and writing
An understanding of statutory/legislative responsibilities