Thinking differently about reflective practice in Australian social work education: A rhapsody

There are many different ways of thinking about reflective practice in social work education in Australia. This research utilises a musical metaphor to illustrate this diversity. Written as a piece of music with album notes, the study utilises a reflexive methodology with a qualitative mixed method approach. Three studies were conducted to explore how reflective practice is understood in social work education and practice in Australia. The first study examined my own learning and teaching of reflective practice through an autoethnographic process. The findings indicated a range of models of reflective practice potentially available to the educator. Also explored in this study were the kinds of reflection these models make possible and visible to educators and students. The second study traced the emergence of reflective practice within Australian social work education by conducting a Foucauldian inspired archaeology. This study demonstrated the emergence of specific models in social work education and how their adoption has transformed the language and discourse of problem-solving within the discipline through the use of specific kinds of social theory. In the final study qualitative interviews with social work students, practitioners and educators were undertaken. This study explored the beliefs, attitudes and values held by participants about reflective practice. The final study illustrated the social and oral nature of reflective practice within the discipline. Participant interviews also indicated that reflective practice is a significant means for solving problems and building understanding for learning and practice for social workers. Overall, the study establishes that current models of reflective practice could be enhanced if more attention was paid to instructing students in critical reflection skills such as deconstruction, evaluation, critique, problematisation and interpretation. This would contribute greatly to the ability of social workers to effectively test the limits of their knowledge and practice in the interests of the people they serve

Values, Beliefs, and Attitudes About Reflective Practice in Australian Social Work Education and Practice

Reflective practice and critical reflection are considered crucial to learning and practising social work. Based on qualitative analysis of interviews with Australian social work practitioners, students, and academics this article offers a description of the strong normative role reflective practice plays in contemporary social work practice. The research was conducted as part of a larger interpretive study into how reflective practice is understood in social work education and practice in Australia. The research found that reflective practice is considered as central to the development of practice wisdom, accountability, and the development of self-awareness. The paper discusses the normative role reflective practice plays for social worker agency. The paper also outlines the formative role social theory plays in the development of critical reflection

Smells like university spirit: Predicting the propensity for student engagement using a customer evangelism model

Engaging students outside the classroom tends to be a hit and miss affair, with exceptional, vocal or troublesome students garnering most of the attention, support and opportunity. The authors of this paper proposes a targeted approach to cultivating highly engaged students and student leadership based on their consumer behaviour rather than their academic merit or self-identification. The theoretical basis for the model employed uses Consumer Culture Theory, in particular Subcultures of Consumption and Customer Evangelism. The goal is to employ a more equitable, coordinated approach to identifying students who are inclined to be highly engaged with university life during and after their academic careers and afterwards, and encourage them to self develop into organic, authentic social networks within the university community which encourage engagement with the university and peer support

Keeping It Real: Applying 360 Degrees of Authenticity

Marketers tout authenticity as the new reality, a means by which consumers in markets of abundance determine value and, at times, prestige. Approaching consumption from a Service- Dominant perspective, where every product has a unique experiential component within which the consumer and producer co-create value, means authenticity is problematic. How can a marketer represent authentically the infinite possibilities of the experiential component of a product? This paper builds on emerging research and a qualitative example to explore the meaning and application of an authenticity framework: the 360 degree model of authenticity

Paramedicine and Social Work: Case Studies in Authentic Student Recruitment

Selling the course experience to future students has been corporatised across the Higher Education sector. At many universities marketing and sales specialists, such as ECU’s Student Recruitment Team, rather than academic staff, field prospective student enquiries. Representing courses authentically is crucial to matching future students with an appropriate course experience and career, as well is managing future students’ expectations. A challenge for academics is communicating the course/career experience to university sales agents (recruiters). A challenge for recruiters is conveying an authentic course experience to future students when they have not taken a course themselves. This paper selects two ECU courses, Social Work and Paramedicine, and examines the relationship between academics and recruiters. Particular emphasis is placed on authentic representation of the course experience to future students. The 360 Degree Authenticity (360da) framework was used to examine the quality of authenticity in communication and sales techniques through convergent interviewing. Findings indicated that authentic representation of the course experience depended on a professional trust between individual academics and individual recruiters. Findings also indicated that academics and sales agents emphasised different aspects of the University to future students; but both used credibility markers such as accreditation. Academics were more focused on the career experience, recruiters were more focused on the university and course experienc

Paramedicine and Social Work: Case Studies in Authentic Student Recruitment

Selling the course experience to future students has been corporatised across the Higher Education sector. At many universities marketing and sales specialists, such as ECU’s Student Recruitment Team, rather than academic staff, field prospective student enquiries. Representing courses authentically is crucial to matching future students with an appropriate course experience and career, as well is managing future students’ expectations. A challenge for academics is communicating the course/career experience to university sales agents (recruiters). A challenge for recruiters is conveying an authentic course experience to future students when they have not taken a course themselves. This paper selects two ECU courses, Social Work and Paramedicine, and examines the relationship between academics and recruiters. Particular emphasis is placed on authentic representation of the course experience to future students. The 360 Degree Authenticity (360da) framework was used to examine the quality of authenticity in communication and sales techniques through convergent interviewing. Findings indicated that authentic representation of the course experience depended on a professional trust between individual academics and individual recruiters. Findings also indicated that academics and sales agents emphasised different aspects of the University to future students; but both used credibility markers such as accreditation. Academics were more focused on the career experience, recruiters were more focused on the university and course experienc

Answering the Call: Generating Contemporary Knowledge About Australian Social Work Activism

The contemporary context, characterised by neoliberalism, serves as a backdrop for social work activism. Social work academics, globally and nationally, have incited an urgent call to activism. Despite this exhortation, ways of practising social work activism remain contested and somewhat mystifying. This study aimed to generate contemporary knowledge about Australian social work activism. The qualitative inquiry, guided by pragmatism, used individual semi-structured and paired depth interviews to explore the experiences of 12 self-identified social work activists. Data analysis generated four core themes: i) Activist Practices Exist on a Continuum; ii) Activism Is Contextually Bound; iii) Activism Is an Inherently Relational Endeavour; and iv) Sustaining Activism for the Long Game. Together, the findings suggest that adopting multiple, contextualised, and interconnected approaches may enable workers to pursue justice at all levels of their practice. These insights contribute to the profession’s understanding of social work activism and may benefit practitioners, students, and educators

Perceptions and needs of rural young people in the south-west of Western Australia : Implications for pedagogy

The original purpose of this study was to investigate youth needs, specifically in the south western region (the \u27South West\u27) of Western Australia, and then to explore how these needs might be addressed in terms of current curriculum and teaching practices. The following research questions guided our investigation: - What are the educational and occupational aspirations of young people from the South West of Western Australia? - What do young people identify as influences on their educational and occupational aspirations and attainment? As the data collection progressed, it was evident to all those involved that, whilst there were expressed needs, many of the young people we interviewed were quite happy with their lives and their lifestyle, despite having varied views of their school experiences (curriculum and teachers), some positive and some negative. The students were able to offer some very thoughtful and clear descriptions of what sorts of things work for them at school, what does not work, and what needs to happen to make school meaningful and relevant to their lives and needs. The title of this report reflects this finding -describing the perceptions as well as the needs of this age group

Reflective practice, reflexivity, and critical reflection in social work education in Australia

Reflective practice, reflexivity, and critical reflection are now widely accepted as important in contemporary social work practice. Despite this, there remain differences in how the terms are discussed within the literature. This results in confusion in how students are instructed about reflective practice, reflexivity, and critical reflection. This paper presents a proposal for clarifying these concepts based on the results from an interpretive study of reflective practice in social work education and practice in Australia. The study utilised three different methods: autoethnography, an archaeological analytic, and qualitative interviews. It found that reflective practice is understood as a capability, a form of critical thinking, a discipline response to a changing sector, and a way of theorising from practice. Conceptual clarifications of reflective practice, reflexivity, and critical reflection are presented