User and carer involvement in social work education: reasons for participation

Abstract

In many countries, user involvement in social work (SW) education is common practice, while in other countries, initiatives for inclusion are currently expanding. No matter how far the progress of user involvement in education has come, issues on clarity, sustainability and accountability need to be addressed. In this paper, users' reasons for wanting to participate in SW education and the way they define their potential contribution are explored. These experiences can provide important information contributing to sustainable, meaningful, and accountable collaborations between users, university staff and students. Participants (n = 33) answered a questionnaire including demographic data and four open-ended questions about their expectations of participation in a SW programme at the University of Dalarna in Sweden. The results from the open-ended questions were analysed using qualitative content analysis. Results show that users' main reasons for wanting to get involved were to contribute through sharing their lived experience of SW education, to help improve services and also to obtain respect for their own personal knowledge and experience. The respondents described themselves both as carriers of valuable knowledge and as accountable experts on the subject.

Exploring the involvement of men who use intimate partner violence in social work education: Student and service user views

“…Research with service users has identified a range of constructive outcomes of their involvement, including making a positive contribution to social work education, the improvement of human services and increased value being placed on service user knowledges in university environments (Schön, 2016a). In Schön's research, service users identified themselves as experts on the subject they were sharing, and as holding knowledge that was invaluable to social work practice.…”

Outcomes focused user involvement in social work education: applying knowledge to practice

“…This review highlighted that current work continues to unite around the process of SUCI, but 'there are gaps in literature about SUCI that aims to add value to social work education rather than to empower service users and carers' (Robinson and Webber, 2013, p.927). Benefits to users and carers Assessment as to whether there is a tangible difference to the well-being and quality of life of service users or carers who receive social work services Internationally, whilst the language used may vary, for example, 'consumer' in the USA, the concept of SUCI in social work education remains largely in the embryonic stages, and 'is still limited' in Nordic countries (Schön, 2016, Askheim, 2012. A series of papers on SUCI in social work education in Central Europe appeared in a Special Issue of Ljetopis Socijalnog Rada (Bašic, 2009, Bornarova, 2009, Brkić and Jugović, 2009, Džombić and Urbanc, 2009).…”

Outcomes focused user involvement in social work education: applying knowledge to practice

“…This review highlighted that current work continues to unite around the process of SUCI, but 'there are gaps in literature about SUCI that aims to add value to social work education rather than to empower service users and carers' (Robinson and Webber, 2013, p.927). Internationally, whilst the language used may vary, for example, 'consumer' in the USA, the concept of SUCI in social work education remains largely in the embryonic stages, and 'is still limited' in Nordic countries (Schön, 2016, Askheim, 2012. A series of papers on SUCI in social work education in Central Europe appeared in a Special Issue of Ljetopis Socijalnog Rada (Bašic, 2009, Bornarova, 2009, Brkić and Jugović, 2009, Džombić and Urbanc, 2009).…”

“…The links between epistemology and SUCI are now visible in the literature and current social work education, the logical next step is to apply service user and carer knowledge, as well as the knowledge students' acquire from spending time with service users and carers, to practice, and to the lives of the people that social workers work with (Level 3 and 4, Table 1). In a recent Swedish study, Schön (2016) explored the reasons why service users and carers participate in social work education. The paper concludes that the main reasons for participation are; to share their lived experience, to help improve services and to obtain respect for their own personal knowledge and experience.…”

“…The findings discussed above provide an insight into some of the issues that have emerged in our data over the last three years, issues that are timely and relevant to the prevailing discourse on social care policy and practice. We have used these findings to start to bridge the current divide between SUCI in social work education and social work practice (Robinson and Webber, 2013), between knowledge creation through SUCI with social work practice (Beresford and Boxall, 2012), and to respond to the expectations of service users and carers that their participation in social work education will impact on practice (Schön, 2016). Our first report (Levy et al, 2014) was distributed to stakeholders involved in social care at local and national level.…”