Home > Arhiva > 2011 > Numar: 4 > Educating the Professional Social Worker: Challenges and Prospects Educating the Professional Social Worker: Challenges and Prospects
by:
- Martin Gill (School of Social Work and Psychology, Elizabeth Fry Building, University of East Anglia, Norwich, NR4 7TJ. Correspondence address: Martin Gill, University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Earlham Road, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK., E-mail: martin.gill@uea.ac.uk)
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Changing organisational contexts and priorities will always have implications for social work education. From the emergence of the new profession, social work educators have adapted to new expectations of the social worker in the contemporary social and political context, expectations which have often been strongly influenced by the employing organisations. After a brief overview of the development of social work education in an organisational framework, this article explores the factors which have shaped social work in the United Kingdom in the past 30 years, particularly in relation to the rise of ‘managerialism’, and the impact this has had on the perception of social workers as professionals in their own right. Finally consideration is given as to whether the new ‘Professional Capabilities Framework’, to be introduced in social work education in the UK from 2013, offers the prospect of social workers strengthening their professional identity so they can work more effectively both within and across organisational boundaries.
Keywords: social work education, organizations, profession
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