Every job has its stereotypes: from grasping lawyers and dodgy car salesman to unethical estate agents and politicians who can’t be trusted.
But few professions are as misunderstood as social work, which has long been seen as a workforce dominated by politically correct busybodies. Let’s explode a few myths about England’s 80,000-plus social workers.
All social workers are women
Men have a powerful part to play in social work, as they can act as positive role models for children who may lack these figures in their lives. Male social workers can build excellent relationships with hard-to-reach fathers and involve them, where safe, in their children’s lives. There are also social-specific programmes run by male social workers for fathers who wish to improve their parenting. Latest figures from local authorities show 78.8% of frontline children and family social workers are female and just 14% are male (7% of respondents did not give data). There are, however, proportionally more men in senior management jobs. A survey by the Association for Directors of Children’s Services shows there are 83 local authorities with female directors, and 69 male directors. Of the 16 interim directors currently in post, 10 are female and six are male.
Social workers are child snatchers
Social workers want to keep children with their families and make sure they can remain safely together. It would be illegal for a social worker to remove a child from his or her birth family, even if a situation was unsafe – only a court can make an order for the removal of a child, and this is something that has to be justified and done as a last resort. But social workers will usually be part of the decision making, working with other agencies in advocating on behalf of a child and family.
Social workers are all left wing
“People tend to think social workers are all left-leaning, politically speaking. So the belief is that they will tend to vote Labour or Green, or maybe Liberal – certainly not Tory,” says Anthony Dhadwal, spokesman for the British Association of Social Workers. “But we have over 80,000 social workers in England and, given the profession is required to have a diverse workforce, it makes sense that we will come from different walks of life and have different views – including on religion and politics.”
Social workers are poorly paid
Pay is on a par with other public sector professions and at the highest level you could earn a very competitive salary as a service manager (£43,000), principal social worker (up to £37,000), or director with regional responsibility and multi-million pound budgets. As a trainee social worker on the Leadership Development programme, run by the charity Frontline, you could receive a tax-free bursary of up to £19,200 in your first year, and in the second year, having qualified, earn a local authority salary of about £30,000 per year.
Once qualified, you are stuck in the same job
Unlike many other professions, social work offers a huge career progression across a range of work. The social work qualification is generic. Although protecting children is massively important, most social workers don’t work in this field for the majority of their careers. They work in the vast array of other services for children and adults, from physical disability to mental health, substance abuse and learning disabilities, to name a few. Within your first three years of qualifying you could be promoted to a senior social worker position or line manage a team as either a consultant social worker or team manager. Fancy something outside statutory social work practice? There are opportunities in academia, consultancy, or as a policy maker – the possibilities are endless. Frontline participants have gone on to do a range of jobs: one now has a role with a research centre specialising in psychoanalysis and another has a strategic position within the civil service.
Social workers are interfering busy bodies
“Social workers are always motivated by a duty to protect adults and children from harm. But our primary role is to enable people to get on with living the lives they want and can live, to promote their rights, so that they can be or become fulfilled and contributing adult citizens. Protection from harm and discrimination is one important part of this bigger goal. Social work should be positive and inspirational, attuned to the fulfilment of the human spirit,” says the BASW’s Dhadwal. Social workers are also bound by the European Convention on Human Rights – in particular Article 8, the right to a private and family life – and can only become involved if families have asked for support or if someone outside the family is worried about the risks to a child. Most families build excellent relationships with their children’s social worker.
Anyone can call themselves a social worker
You’ll need a bachelor’s degree or master’s degree in social work, approved by the Health and Care Professions Council, to be employed as a social worker.
You can study as an undergraduate, which will usually take three years, full-time. If you’ve already got a first degree in another subject, you can take a two-year master’s degree in social work. Alternatively, if you prefer a more work-based approach to learning, you could apply to join the Frontline Leadership Development programme, where you will qualify after the first year with a postgraduate diploma and study towards a funded master’s qualification in the second year.
Social workers will be doomed to a lifetime of stress and exhaustion
If you need a social worker then by definition you’re in a position where there’s a crisis or difficulty, so that brings a level of stress to the person dealing with it. But, far from working in isolation, social workers often work jointly with colleagues or professionals from other agencies. In the case of a child, that means working with the “team around the child”, meaning everyone has responsibility. On the Frontline Leadership Development programme you work with three other trainee social workers in a unit model within a local authority, regularly discussing possible situations and actions – to ensure you are making the best decision for the children and families.
Social workers have to leave their feelings at home and face mountains of paperwork
Social workers regularly spend time reflecting on their feelings and behaviours, and how they might impact their work with families, during regular supervision and in team meetings. Participants on the Frontline Leadership Development programme are encouraged to think creatively, to make the lives of the people they come into contact with better. This does not mean more paperwork. “Social work has, in recent years, gone digital. Offices tend to be ‘paperless’, so we are generally a paper-light profession,” says Dhadwal. “There are, of course, times when things need to be printed, but the days when social workers had filing cabinets stuffed with files and paperwork are gone.”
Social work is just a job
Social workers are passionate about social injustice, discrimination and making a difference to the lives of vulnerable children and families. Social workers can have a big impact on the lives of the people they work with – from building a relationship with a young person to enabling a child to return to their birth family after spending time in care. If you are passionate about transforming the lives of vulnerable children and families, then submit your application to the Frontline programme before the 20 November deadline.
