Social work education

Adult learning approaches require professionals to identify their learning needs. Learning about dementia syndromes is a complex task because of the insidious onset and variable course of the disease processes, the inexorability of cognitive and functional loss, and the emotional impact of neurodegenerative disorders on those experiencing them and on their family and professional carers.

Service users, carers and academics describe participation in the social work degree at Kingston University and St George's University London. It looks at the different ways that users and carers are involved in the course, including teaching, role-playing activities, marking students' work and the selection process for students applying to on the course. It also looks at the importance of the university providing appropriate training and support, the benefits students get from contact with users and carers and what users and carers gain from the experience.

A modified Delphi study was carried out in order to obtain consensus regarding the content of a university training course to involve service users and carers at all stages of the health and social care educational process within a higher education environment. Telephone interviews were carried out with service users and carers, educationalists and leaders in the field of service user and carer involvement to generate curriculum ideas.

This paper provides an account of one university's experience of involving service users and carers in the delivery of the new undergraduate and postgraduate social work degrees. It poses the question as to whether user and carer involvement in social work education can be viewed as a means of promoting citizen participation or whether it is a case of manipulating relatively powerless groups. In addressing this question, service users and carers and social work tutors describe, from their own distinct perspectives, the processes in which they were both involved.

Involving service users and carers in the education and training of social workers is higher on the agenda in developed countries than ever before. Higher education institutions that run these programmes are required to involve service users and carers at all levels of the design and delivery of the programmes. The experiences of user involvement in social work education in the countries of transition, such as Macedonia, are however lacking.

This paper describes a teaching and learning initiative developed in a UK social work programme that has involved carers, service users, academic social work staff and practitioners. Post‐graduate student social workers spend 24 hours in agreed periods with family carers or people who use social work services. The paper explains the origins of this initiative, rooted in a model of service user and carer involvement established over a number of years within the social work programme at the University of Dundee, Scotland.

This good practice guide is based on research conducted in 2008, and commissioned to explore the extent of service user and carer involvement in the Higher and Further Education sectors in west and southeast Scotland. Through this guide it is hoped that good practice can be shared and lessons learned. This guide is a tool to support the effective engagement of people who use services and carers in social work education. It is evidence-based and applicable to educators working in the social care field and beyond including health, early years and childcare.

Service users, carers and academics describe participation in the social work degree at Bucks New University. It looks at the different ways that users and carers are involved in the course, the importance of the university providing appropriate training and support, the benefits students get from contact with users and carers and what users and carers gain from the experience. The video will be of interest to social worker educators, students on social work courses, people working more broadly in co-production/participation and service users and carers.

This paper addresses a number of issues concerning the future prospects for social work and mental health in England and the implications of these for social work education. In particular the significance of interprofessional practice and education will be examined and these will be located within the wider context of the social work contribution to mental health services. The experience of social work in promoting the interests and involvement of service users and carers and of working within a holistic model will also be recognised.

Requirements set out for the social work degree and post‐qualifying framework specify the involvement of service users and carers on a number of levels. Research indicates that service user and carer involvement can benefit students, professionals and service users and carers themselves. To keep up with demands placed on service users and carers by higher education institutions and other social work bodies, the issue of capacity needs to be addressed.