Law in social work education: reviewing the evidence on teaching, learning and assessment

This paper presents the findings from a systemic review of knowledge relating to current practice in the teaching, learning and assessment of law in social work education. The research comprised an internationally conducted systematic review of the literature, together with a survey of current education practice in the four countries of the UK. Two consultation events sought the views of a range of stakeholders, including the perspectives of service users and carers. Set in the context of debates about the relationship between law and social work practice, this paper identifies the common themes emerging from the review and offers an analysis of key findings, together with priorities for future directions in education practice

Pregnancy and early parenting trajectories among young people experiencing street-entrenchment : a qualitative study

Background: Qualitative research demonstrates that, among youth who use substances in the context of entrenched poverty and homelessness, pregnancy is often viewed as an event that could change the trajectories of their lives. However, young people’s desires and decision-making regarding how to make changes do not always align with the perspectives of various professionals and systems regarding how best to intervene. Methods: This study draws on 14 months of longitudinal qualitative interviews and ethnographic fieldwork with 16 youth (under 29 years of age) to explore how pregnancy and early parenting shaped their trajectories. Eight of the 16 participants self-identified as Indigenous. Findings: The young people who participated in this study described pregnancy as a life event that could stabilize tumultuous romantic relationships and deepen a sense of romantic love in the midst of the everyday emergencies of substance use, homelessness, and poverty. As “moral assemblages,” romantic relationships shaped decision-making surrounding pregnancy and parenting on the streets, including the decision of whether or not to enter treatment. Consistent with previous research, pregnancy was envisioned by youth as a turning point that might allow them to realize different kinds of futures. However, intervention by child protection, healthcare, and criminal justice systems were often at odds with what youth envisioned for themselves, their families, and the future. In particular, interventions that separated young couples were often perceived by youth as destabilizing the very relationships that they felt would allow them to successfully navigate a pregnancy and create a family. Conclusions: This study highlights how a disjuncture between youth’s decision-making surrounding pregnancy and parenting and the systems that are intended to help them can further entrench young parents in cycles of loss, defeat, and harm that can be powerfully racialized. Two young people were not in romantic relationships during their pregnancies and were better able to navigate child protection and healthcare system demands and draw on other kinds of social support to ultimately maintain custody of their children. However, these fragile success stories further underscore the need for structural interventions that provide access to housing and income among vulnerable young parents.Graduate and Postdoctoral StudiesGraduat

The generative potential of mess in community-based participatory research with young people who use(d) drugs in Vancouver

Abstract Community-based participatory research (CBPR) is increasingly standard practice for critical qualitative health research with young people who use(d) drugs in Vancouver, Canada. One aim of CBPR in this context is to redress the essentialization, erasure, and exploitation of people who use(d) drugs in health research. In this paper, we reflect on a partnership that began in 2018 between three university researchers and roughly ten young people (ages 17–28) who have current or past experience with drug use and homelessness in Greater Vancouver. We focus on moments when our guiding principles of shared leadership, safety, and inclusion became fraught in practice, forcing us in some cases to re-imagine these principles, and in others to accept that certain ethical dilemmas in research can never be fully resolved. We argue that this messiness can be traced to the complex and diverse positionalities of each person on our team, including young people. As such, creating space for mess was ethically necessary and empirically valuable for our CBPR project.Medicine, Faculty ofOther UBCNon UBCMedicine, Department ofReviewedFacultyResearche

Harm reduction calls to action from young people who use drugs on the streets of Vancouver and Lisbon.

Vancouver, Canada, and Lisbon, Portugal, are both celebrated for their world-leading harm reduction policies and programs and regarded as models for other cities contending with the effects of increasing levels of drug use in the context of growing urban poverty. However, we challenge the notion that internationally celebrated places like Lisbon and Vancouver are meeting the harm reduction needs of young people who use drugs (YPWUD; referring here to individuals between the ages of 14 and 29). In particular, the needs of YPWUD in the context of unstable housing, homelessness, and ongoing poverty-a context which we summarize here as "street involvement"-are not being adequately met. We are a group of community and academic researchers and activists working in Vancouver, Lisbon, and Pittsburgh. Most of us identify as YPWUD and have lived and living experience with the issues described in this comment. We make several calls to action to support the harm reduction needs of YPWUD in the context of street involvement in and beyond our settings

Harm reduction calls to action from young people who use drugs on the streets of Vancouver and Lisbon

Vancouver, Canada, and Lisbon, Portugal, are both celebrated for their world-leading harm reduction policies and programs and regarded as models for other cities contending with the effects of increasing levels of drug use in the context of growing urban poverty. However, we challenge the notion that internationally celebrated places like Lisbon and Vancouver are meeting the harm reduction needs of young people who use drugs (YPWUD; referring here to individuals between the ages of 14 and 29). In particular, the needs of YPWUD in the context of unstable housing, homelessness, and ongoing poverty—a context which we summarize here as “street involvement”—are not being adequately met. We are a group of community and academic researchers and activists working in Vancouver, Lisbon, and Pittsburgh. Most of us identify as YPWUD and have lived and living experience with the issues described in this comment. We make several calls to action to support the harm reduction needs of YPWUD in the context of street involvement in and beyond our settings.Medicine, Faculty ofNon UBCMedicine, Department ofReviewedFacultyResearcherOthe