Memorandum submitted by Warren Carratt,
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report has been compiled by the Workforce
Strategy, Planning & Development Manager, Director of Locality
Services and Director of Targeted Services within the Children
& Young People's Service of Rotherham Metropolitan Borough
Council. There are currently 143 qualified Social Workers employed
in Children & Young People's Services in Rotherham, located
throughout seven Locality Teams, Fostering and Adoption Services,
Disability Services and Children's Residential Care. Rotherham's
last reported vacancy rate for Social Care was 9.89%, with a turnover
rate of 10.3% in 2008. Rotherham is home to in the region of 69,000
children and young people, and Rotherham's statistical neighbours
are Doncaster, Redcar and Cleveland, Wigan, Barnsley, Tameside,
Hartlepool, St Helens, Wakefield, Dudley and Telford and Wrekin.
1. Whilst entry routes to social work do have
flexibility, there is a University requirement for applicants
to demonstrate evidence of experience in a related field, in the
very least dealing with people. In regards to mature entrants
to the field of social work, Rotherham currently employ social
workers in the following age groups:
|
| Age | >30
| 21 to 30 | 31 to 40
| 41 to 50 |
|
| Total employees | 59
| 29 | 27
| 28 |
|
There are no reported issues in Rotherham with mature entrants,
re-entrants and people considering a career change accessing the
social work field, though it is common for entrants of all ages
to have a very limited conception of the role of social work and
the broader Children & Young People's Service provision. Anecdotal
evidence suggests this may be related to a lack of readily accessible
information in the public domain, and that this—combined
with the requirement for previous experience of working in a related
field before being able to access social work training—could
potentially hinder mature entrants and people wanting a career
change.
2. The profile of social work nationally is considered
to be the biggest debilitating factor for any entrants joining
the profession, as negative publicity and reports of many staff
leaving the profession re-enforces the image that social work
is a high-pressured, thankless job, particularly when linked to
remuneration and compared with other professions in Health and
Education, where the public and media profile is much higher.
3. Rotherham has been running the "Grow Your Own"
social work programme for the last two years, where staff have
either been funded to attain the Bachelor's degree, or post-graduates
have been funded through the MA route. During the roll out of
"Grow Your Own", 100% of the students have been 25 or
over, with an age range of 27 years-50 years.
4. The consensus in Rotherham is that the three year
bachelor's degree is the right format and level for initial social
work training. With the role of social work existing now in a
"one children's workforce", the level of qualification
reflects the qualification level requirement of Health colleagues
(omitting Health Visitors who require a higher level of qualification
than a three year bachelor's degree).
5. Feedback from students undertaking the MA route to
social work cites the intense nature of the programme and the
amount of work needed in a relatively short time as barriers to
successful completion. However, the main area of concern for social
work in Rotherham is the new "Combined Degree" being
offered by local provider Sheffield Hallam University. Staff at
Rotherham feel that a combined course diminishes the importance
and identity of both social work and learning disability nursing,
and there is little guidance for the structure of the practice
learning opportunities, in particular relation to where responsibility
for coordinating these placements sits.
6. Current proposals for a probationary year for newly
qualified social workers with a protected caseload have been well
received by teams, though there is the potential side effect of
this putting more undue pressure on existing, experienced workers,
as only a third of the usual caseload would be assumed by the
newly qualified Social Worker. It may be appropriate to have a
formalised "buddying" system for new starters, where
they have a formal and recognised relationship with a more experienced
worker. Beyond supporting the new member of staff, the organisation
can also ensure that any workforce skills at risk from staff retirement
could be sustained more effectively.
7. At present, there is no evidence in Rotherham to suggest
that the generic social work degree is not fit for purpose, although
many staff at Rotherham believe a specific Children and Young
People route would be beneficial. Evidence shows that there is
an extremely high correlation between final practice learning
placements and first employment post. Serious consideration would
need to be given to ensure links between the availability of practice
learning opportunities within children's services and the recruitment
needs of this service are running parallel, to avoid any future
shortfalls, though this is an issue which should be managed by
the nominated workforce planning lead within the Local Authority.
Practice learning teachers have become—by the very nature
of social work at the moment and the national shortage thereof—short
in supply, and even with an honorarium scheme in operation, it
is difficult for staff to balance students with their own caseloads.
One area in which this could be remedied is by changing the nature
of how existing social workers see students ie not as a drain
on resources, but as an added resource to the social work team,
and recommendations are made in point 12 of this report as to
how this change could be achieved.
8. Whilst the content of training qualifications seems
to be appropriate, it is Rotherham's view that the "balance
of knowledge, skills, values and experience", whilst ideally
the correct ones are actually aspirational in the current climate
and context.
9. There is no clear or anecdotal evidence that the shift
to degree level qualification has improved the calibre of recruits
or the effectiveness of newly qualified social workers.
10. Higher education institutions are far more likely
to offer social work qualifications if they have strong relationships
with Local Authorities in the surrounding regional area which
ensure that practice learning placements can be found. The experience
of these placements should also be at the heart of whether a university
chooses to offer this type of qualification, though it is unclear
if this is an influence or not. Modifications need to be made
to the way in which universities offer and arrange placements
to Local Authorities, as at present this is something which severely
limits long-term planning, which perpetuates an environment when
last minute arrangements have to be made regularly, the result
of which seriously jeopardises the holistic placement experience.
11. The CWDC provide workshops and toolkits to support
effective workforce planning, though these methods are based on
the assumption that an interest in social work is out there. There
is little evidence at present to suggest that the CWDC, DCSF and
DIUS will jointly support a national campaign to raise the profile
of social work as a profession, and this is something that is
paramount to the success of future social workers opting into
the vocation. Evidence demonstrates how a well thought out and
widely advertised campaign can improve the status of a profession,
as teaching has benefited in recent years from this kind of national
investment and stimulus.
12. The quality of post-qualifying training can be assured
by Local Authorities maintaining strong links with both internal
staff and external providers, and ensuring that robust evaluation
methods are in place to link outcomes from post-qualifying training
to the business needs of the Local Authority. One recommendation
would be to have post-qualification routes running parallel to
one another but in different specialist areas eg one for World
Class Practitioner, another for World Class Leader of a service.
As social work managers are often drawn from experienced social
work practitioners, it makes sense to have the distinction between
the two career paths as early on as possible, and provide the
appropriate and equally accredited training for either option.
In regard to point 7 of this report, it could be part of a social
workers commitment to achieving post-qualification status to agree
to demonstrate their own competency by becoming a practice teacher.
This could be tied into a University's assessment criteria, and
would therefore ensure that social workers are continuing to develop
post-qualifying whilst also feeding this back into the future
of the profession, at a local level. A national directive on this
would avoid agreements having to be informally on an ad-hoc basis
between Local Authorities and FE providers.
13. Newly qualified social workers will continue to develop
if they have a clear and achievable career pathway available to
them and they know how and when movement along this pathway can
be made. The two greatest problems Local Authorities face is finding
the resource to fund further, accredited post-qualification study
for existing social workers, and then ensuring that these skills
are retained within the Authority. It is not uncommon for Social
Workers to develop through either initial qualification or even
post qualification, and then take these skills to other Authorities
where the recruitment issues are not as severe or the remuneration
is more enhanced. Budgetary pressures being what they are, this
is something that is very difficult to remedy by remuneration
alone, and as long as newly qualified social workers leave Rotherham
for other Local Authorities, the situation of social worker shortage
becomes a self-perpetuating issue.
14. Employers support the development of social workers
as effectively as possible, though again this is something that
is placed at greater risk with the advent of the One Children's
Workforce and the push towards integration. With the Secretary
of State for Children, Schools and Families declaring that social
workers should be educated to Master level once in post, it is
difficult for employers to commit to fund this type of training
in a fair, equitable and progressive way without either sacrificing
development of other areas of the children's workforce, or by
having a drip-drip programme for developing social workers which
equates to taking the best part of a century to get all staff
through this level of qualification. This also has to be balanced
with the needs of front-line services, and any and all development
of social workers—if accredited—should have a large
amount of work based assessment included to ensure that workloads
are not overloaded exponentially.
15. Rotherham has a clear commitment to the importance
of supervision for all front line workers in C&YPS, and have
put in place a joint [along with the PCT] Supervision Policy as
part of the role out of Children's Trust requirements. The specific
supervision of social workers is seen as a key task, but its integrity
and reliability is challenged in times of extreme pressure, both
from a public perception and resource point of view.
April 2009
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