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Abstract
Social workers have historically had an ambivalent relationship with recordkeeping. A multi-disciplinary action research project, ‘Who am I?’, has brought together social workers, archivists and historians to investigate the role of records as a resource for identity construction for children currently in out-of-home care, and for adults who were in care as children. Maintaining a focus on children growing up in out-of-home care, their identity needs, and the way in which records can support them, this paper discusses a range of problems arising from current recordkeeping practices within the Victorian out-of-home care sector. These are examined in the light of conceptual frameworks brought by the archival and social work disciplines. While out-of-home care practitioners and their organisations have much to learn from archival methods, recordkeeping professionals also need to recognise the relevance of their role to how records are created in the first place, in order to ensure that personal records remain relevant and accessible across the lifespan of children and young people who grow up in care.
Notes
1. CREATE Young Consultant. Young consultants are young people trained and supported by CREATE to tell others in the community what it is like to be in care. They represent CREATE and young people in care at conferences, consultations, forums and other events.
2. See for example Sue Cumming et al, ‘Raising the Titanic: Rescuing Social Work Documnetation from the Sea of Ethical Risk’, Australian Social Work, vol. 60, no. 2, June 2007, p. 241; Natalie Ames, ‘Social Work Recording: A New Look at an Old Issue’, Journal of Social Work Education, vol. 35, no. 2, Spring/Summer 1999, pp. 227–8 ; JD Kagle, ‘Record Keeping: Directions for the 1990s’, Social Work, vol. 38, no. 2 (March 1993), p. 190; Susan Tebb, ‘Client-Focused Recording: Linking Theory and Practice’, Families in Society: the Journal of Contemporary Human Services, vol. 72, no. 7, 1991, p. 430.
3. Jan Steyaert, ‘Peeling the Client Information System Onion: An International Perspective’, in Nick Gould and Keith Moultrie (eds), Effective Policy, Planning and Implementation, Ashgate, Aldershot, 1997, pp. 35–44.
4. For more details of the ‘Who am I?’ research project, please see Gavan J McCarthy, Shurlee Swain and Cate O’Neill, ‘Archives and Identity Formation for Forgotten Australians and Other Survivors of Out-of-home Care’, Archives and Manuscripts, vol. 40, no. 1, March 2012, pp. 1–3.
5. Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission, Bringing them Home: The Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families, Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission, Sydney, 1997.
6. Senate Community Affairs References Committee, Lost Innocents: Righting the Record. Report on child migration, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, ACT, 2001.
7. Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee, Forgotten Australians: A Report on Australians who Experienced Institutional or Out-of-home Care as Children, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, ACT, 2004.
8. Care leaver’s evidence, quoted in Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee, Forgotten Australians, p. 255.
9. These issues are further discussed in other articles in this journal issue: Cate O’Neill, Vlad Selakovic and Rachel Tropea, ‘Access to Records for People who were in Out-of-home Care: Moving Beyond “Third Dimension” Archival Practice’, Archives and Manuscripts, vol. 40, no. 1, March 2012, pp. 29–41; Shurlee Swain and Nell Musgrove, ‘We Are The Stories We Tell About Ourselves: Child Welfare Records and the Construction of Identity among Australians who, as Children, Experienced Out-of-home “Care”’, Archives and Manuscripts, vol. 40, no. 1, March 2012, pp. 4–14.
10. Sue McKemmish, ‘Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow: A Continuum of Responsibility’, Proceedings of the Records Management Association of Australia 14th National Convention, 15–17 September 1997, RMAA Perth 1997, available at < http://infotech.monash.edu/research/groups/rcrg/publications/recordscontinuum-smckp2.html >, accessed May 2011.
11. Sue McKemmish, ‘Placing Records Continuum Theory and Practice’, Archival Science, vol. 1, no. 4, December 2001, p. 335.
12. Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission, Bringing them Home.
13. Richard Rose and Terry Philpot, The Child’s Own Story: Life Story Work with Traumatized Children, Jessica Kingsley Publishers, London, 2005, p. 26.
14. This discussion of the life story pyramid draws on the paper by Lauren Cowling: ‘A Collaborative Life Story Archive? Issues for Reflection and Discussion’, Preliminary Discussion Paper for the ‘Who am I?’ Current Practice Workshop 2, June 2009, available at < http://www.cfecfw.asn.au/know/research/sector-research-partnership/partnership-projects >, accessed 5 May 2011. Cowling cites a range of similar models which have been proposed within the life story work literature, for example: P Baynes, ‘Untold Stories: A Discussion of Life Story Work’, Adoption & Fostering, vol. 32, no. 2, 2008, pp. 43–9; B Betts and A Ahmad, My Life Story, Information Plus, Orkney, 2003; V Fahlberg, A Child’s Journey Through Placement, Perspectives Press, Indianapolis, 1991; E Nicholls, ‘Model Answer’, Community Care, no. 1479, 7 March 2003, pp. 32–4; Rose and Philpot, The Child’s Own Story.
15. Terri Scott and Shelley Cameron, ‘Identity, Self-esteem and the use of Life Books for Children and Young People in Care’, Developing Practice, no. 10, Winter 2004, p. 59.
16. L Campbell, ‘Supporting the Journey: Issues in Co-creating a Sensitive Narrative of the Child’s Identity and Experience “in care”’, Report of ‘Who am I?’ Current Practice Workshop 2, June 2009, pp. 5–6, available at < http://www.cfecfw.asn.au/know/research/sector-research-partnership/partnership-projects >, accessed 5 May 2011.
17. Discussion papers and reports relating to this workshop series are available on the ‘Who am I?’ project website, available at < http://www.cfecfw.asn.au/know/research/sector-research-partnership/partnership-projects >, accessed 5 May 2011.
18. Margaret Kertesz, ‘100+ points of identity – Gathering Young People’s History for the Future: Final Report’, April 2011, available at < http://www.cfecfw.asn.au/know/research/sector-research-partnership/partnership-projects >, accessed 5 May 2011.
19. Keypass is a validated photo identification card, with name, address, date of birth, signature and emergency contact details. See <www.keypass.com.au>.
20. Margaret Kertesz, ‘The Next Steps Forward: Moving Towards Child-Focused Identity Construction’, Report of ‘Who am I?’ Current Practice Workshop 4, December 2009, p. 2, available at < http://www.cfecfw.asn.au/know/research/sector-research-partnership/partnership-projects >, accessed 5 May 2011; Kertesz, ‘100+ points of identity’, p. 17.
21. Focus group participants, during research undertaken for Kersetsz, ‘100+ points of identity’.
22. Respondent to the data accessibility exercise, quoted in Kertesz, ‘100+ points of identity’, p. 20.
23. Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee, Forgotten Australians, p. 259.
24. Respondent to the data accessibility exercise, quoted in Kertesz, ‘100+ points of identity’, p. 23.
25. Kertesz, ‘100+ points of identity’, p. 25.
26. For a more detailed discussion of context, see O’Neill, Selakovic and Tropea, ‘Access to Records for People who were in Out-of-home Care’.
27. McKemmish, ‘Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow’, p. 9. ‘What electronic recordkeeping has forced us to confront is that archival methods must be applied thoughout the life of the record. Now new problems arise as records age.’
28. Participant in ‘Who am I?’ Workshop 2, 26 June 2009.