Summary

Though all students of social work discipline in Bangladesh are required to attend field practicum before graduation, there is a lack of knowledge about the experiences and challenges of Bangladeshi social work students in field settings. This study was conducted to explore recent Bangladeshi social work graduate-student perspectives, experiences, and challenges in their field practicum period at different institutions. A phenomenological research approach was followed. For gathering data, 10 recent-graduate students (5 male and 5 female) from the Institute of Social Welfare and Research at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh were interviewed in this study. Also, two FGDs (Focus Group Discussion) were conducted (each consisting of 5 students) in the same educational institution to uncover students’ lived experiences on field placement. The study showed that students had a positive experience in their field settings. They were able to connect their classroom education to the practice fields. Also, they got the chance to receive firsthand experience and develop work-related skills. However, some students revealed the lack of coordination between educational institutions and agencies. Also, the lack of support and guidance from the institutional supervisors and agency supervisors has been portrayed by few students. Some agencies were not aware of the roles and responsibilities of students in their organizations. Students urged for better coordination and collaboration between the educational institutions’ supervisors and agency supervisors. Also, they recommended developing a comprehensive plan/guideline by both educational institutions and agencies to guide students during their field practice. 

Keywords (separate with commas)

Social Work, Field Placement, Experiences, and Challenges of Students, Bangladesh

Summary

The Canadian Association of Children’s Education in Pakistan (CACEP) uses an innovative, holistic, community-oriented model to promote gender justice through the education of children in a conflict-affected region of Pakistan bordering Afghanistan. Pakistan has some of the largest gaps in access to education and gender equality globally, which worsen in rural regions. An anti-colonial approach is therefore necessary to support justice, equality, and self-determination since girls’ education is a contested issue in the Pashtun region of Pakistan. Through a transnational solidarity model, CACEP learns from the families and communities it serves on a micro-level and aims to share its unique model at a macro-level with the larger global community. Guided by mutual aid theory, a decolonial framework and community-based participatory action research, CACEP seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of its model and improve its impact. This research project engages CACEP families, scholarship patrons, staff, and volunteers through focus groups and photovoice methodologies to understand experiences, strengths, and areas of improvement for CACEP's model. Key objectives include: 1) improving CACEP's model through critical insights of CACEP stakeholders, 2) sharing CACEP's research-informed practice model with international social development practitioners and policymakers, 3) strengthening gender justice and girls' education support through knowledge mobilization in Pakistan and globally, and 4) creating a foundation for further research through partnerships. Presenters from a transnational Canadian and Pakistani team will highlight CACEP’s model, participatory action research methodology, and preliminary findings from the advisory committee, focus group, and photovoice process. 

Keywords (separate with commas)

 Girls’ education, participatory action research, gender justice

Summary

Older adults tend to be stereotyped as a vulnerable, passive and dependent group in the global context of disaster. This project aims to portray, by exploring the contributions of older personal support workers (PSWs, aged 50+) within their individual-work-family triangulation, a different perspective, that is that older adults are empowered and resilient stakeholders. This qualitative project interviewed 13 older PSWs who provided direct and essential support to vulnerable people in long-term care (LTC) facilities and in general community settings in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) of Canada during the first three waves of the COVID-19 pandemic. The project discovered the following contributions of these older PSWs. At the individual level, they protected their own physical and mental well-being. At the work level, they took up extra responsibilities to reduce the spread of the virus, managed and coped with their clients’ unfavourable behaviours and stresses, and maintained the organization’s operation by supporting their co-workers. At the family level, they eased their family’s financial hardships and protected their family members from the virus. In the context of high health risk and resource shortage situations associated with COVID-19, this study puts forth that older PSWs were a group of dedicated and committed professionals who contributed their experience, skills, energy and knowledge to support the vulnerable population, which shed light on the idea of more widely engaging older adults into emergency response.\\ 

Keywords (separate with commas)

Personal Support workers, Older adult, COVID-19, social service emergency response

Summary

In the United States, 85.5% of 1,029 social workers in a national study (NASW, 2015) experienced psychological aggression by clients. Recently, 30% of social workers felt their employers did not adequately address workplace safety (NASW, 2022). With snowball sampling, 16 social workers in a state of the United States were interviewed about their experiences and perceptions of Client Violence (CV). Nvivo12 was used to code the transcribed interview data to validate analyses grounded in the Theory of Planned Behavior. CV was categorized with open coding and grouped into themes with pattern coding. Specifically, this study explores how White and African American social workers handle CV similarly or differently. The participants were 24 to 61 years old. Ten were Whites (62.5%), and six were African Americans (37.5%). They represented frontline workers (50%), administrators (43.75%), or in both roles (6.25%). They worked in child protection services (n=8), women’s shelters (n=2), hospitals (n=2), behavioral health services (n=2), hospice (n=1), and private practice (n=1). They were in their present job for 9.03 years. All participants had experienced CV, the most common forms being verbal abuse, life threats, and property damage. Four similar themes were found among both White and African American social workers: client-worker alliance training, shared-experience planning, agency responsiveness, and community-engaged support. Participants suggested using an agency-initiated worker protection program with tools to handle CV. The first tool is a prevention program with guidelines to form healthy worker-client alliances for increasing staff protection. The second tool is a list of ground rules in social work practice. The third tool is research on social workers’ interaction skills in justice-centered client conversations. The final tool is an advocacy message about how to handle CV alerts. This research suggests making an agency policy to address CV worldwide, including self-care and racial justice principles for workplace safety.

Keywords (separate with commas)

Social Workers, Client Violence, Toolkit, Safe Workplace, Inclusive Workplace, Workplace Safety, Self-Care, Racial Justice