Filling the Gap? Romanian Social Workers’“Migration” Into the UK

The recent past decades have seen an increased transnational mobility among internationally educated social workers. For example, the UK social work system has seen an increased level of social workers recruited from abroad in certain fields of practice, mainly due to the staff shortage. This opinion paper aims to draw attention to the challenges faced by internationally qualified social workers in their efforts to integrate and adapt their practice to the UK system, with a focus on Romanian social workers, identified as a numerically significant group of ‘trained abroad’ social workers. The paper also highlights the lack of research available to understand the factors contributing to the social work professional immigration into the UK and is examining the connection between professional acculturation and successful practice. The article aims to act as a call for research and collaboration between social work providers and professional regulatory bodies, both in Romania and UK, as well as employers in order to develop focused research and practice guidance in this area.



Keywords: professional migration, international social workers, professional acculturation, cultural competence