Transforming Practice Education in Social Work

We were commissioned by a consortium of Social Work Teaching Partnerships to support the development of a national strategy for Social Work Practice Education. The project was funded through the DfE Social Work Teaching Partnerships FY2022-23 Continuous Improvement Funding.

At the core of the project was the development and facilitation of two ‘Call to Action’ conferences at Sheffield Hallam University and Kingston University in January 2023. The focus of the events was to consider how to address the challenges facing social work practice education and to identify what should be taken forward at a national level.

Table discussions generated ideas and proposals for change - with discussions guided by a series of set questions that we had developed and shared prior to the events. We then held an interactive session to include voting and feedback on proposals, which enabled individuals to express personal views and gathered a snapshot of levels of consensus across proposals.

With over 100 attendees, the events were highly successful in generating rich conversation and ideas. As a result, Interface drafted a report making recommendations for the next steps. As a result of the report, Interface was asked by the Teaching Partnerships to draft a letter to DfE calling for a written response to key demands arising from the events.