Carers as partners in social work education

This report explores the extent and nature of participation by caregivers in the education of social work students in England. A national survey gave rise to a series of telephone interviews with education providers; regional workshops then brought together for discussion representives of carers' organisations, individual caregivers and educators. The study identified the ways in which caregivers are involved in educating social work students, the challenges experienced, the factors that facilitate positive involvement, and the outcomes experienced by those involved. The report makes a series of recommendations designed to facilitate good practice in caregiver participation in social work education

Failure to Fail? Practice Educators' Emotional Experiences of Assessing Failing Social Work Students

The paper explores issues that arise in the assessment of failing social work students in practice learning settings in England. It draws on existing literature on the topic, as well as a small empirical study. The qualitative methodology is influenced by practitioner-research paradigms. Based on twenty in-depth interviews with practice educators, the research utilised the voice-centred relational method of data analysis which revealed five distinct “emotional stories”, explaining why practice assessors’ found the process of working with a failing student challenging and difficult. These stories include the “guilty story”, “angry story”, the “what is my role story”, the “idealised learner story, and the “internalisation of failure so I couldn’t always fail them story”. The paper considers the possible adverse impact on the assessment process of these often unacknowledged emotional responses experienced by practice educators, namely, that there is a very real possibility that students are being passed as competent when the evidence may strongly suggest otherwise. The paper offers some ways forward in light of the findings, linking these to the change process underway in social work education in England but suggesting these have wider relevance to practice assessment in other contexts

How to Use Collaborative Art-Making for Dialogue and Communication

Les artistes ont souvent utilisé des oeuvres d’art pour exprimer des émotions et ainsi susciter un dialogue public sur les défis contemporains. Dans le même temps, il a été suggéré que la création artistique collaborative pouvait être utilisée dans les processus de délibération environnementale, où des acteurs concernés discutent de problèmes litigieux tels que les effets des inondations. Les acteurs politiques ont rarement été profondément impliqués dans ces processus. Nos recherches récentes ont montré que l’art collaboratif pouvait être utilisé pour développer les relations entre les diverses acteurs, y compris les acteurs politiques, dans les processus de délibération, en créant des oeuvres d’art pour amener les préoccupations dans le domaine public.Artists have often used artworks to express emotions and thus prompt public dialogue about contemporary challenges. At the same time, it has been suggested that collaborative art-making can be used in environmental deliberation processes, where stakeholder groups discuss contentious challenges such as the effects of flooding. Policy actors have rarely been deeply involved in these processes. Our recent research showed that collaborative art could be used to develop relationships between groups, including policy actors, in deliberation processes, by creating artworks to bring concerns into the public domain.Arts & Humanities Research Counci

Collaborative Art-Making for Deliberation in Africa

Across West Africa and East Africa, policy actors and citizens have tended to discuss socio-environmental issues in ways that recognise emotional, subjective viewpoints, but can be antagonistic. Although deliberation literature suggests that collaborative arts-based activities can encourage consideration of affective dimensions, their major value in these emotive, hierarchical and antagonistic contexts is to promote more convivial working relationships.Arts & Humanities Research Counci

L’usage des arts pour le dialogue environnemental au Sahel

L’art a été utilisé pour communiquer les préoccupations environnementales dans les pays sahéliens. Néanmoins, le dialogue dirigé par les arts entre les acteurs politiques et les citoyens est cependant rare, bien qu’il ait le potentiel de trouver des solutions aux problèmes socio-environnementaux complexes. Il est indispensable d’exploiter ce potentiel, alors que des défis, tels que le changement climatique, s’accélèrent et touchent les populations. La sensibilisation aux processus de dialogue menés par les arts pourrait être renforcée, parallèlement à davantage de recherches sur les contextes dans lesquelles ils sont appropriés et sur la meilleure façon de les utiliser.This IDS Policy Briefing contains an English summary and recommendations on page 4. Art has been used to communicate environmental concerns in Sahelian countries. Nevertheless, arts-led dialogue between policy actors and citizens is rare, despite its potential to find solutions to complex socio-environmental problems. Harnessing this potential is essential as challenges such as climate change accelerate. Factors that constrain dialogue include a strongly hierarchical and sectorally divided professional and social context. Artists and citizens also risk confrontation with authorities when they express controversial opinions. Not every situation is therefore appropriate for arts-led dialogue. Yet, when facilitated with humour and effective examples, it can create a relaxed space for intersectoral deliberation. Awareness of arts-led dialogue processes could be increased, along with more research on the contexts in which they are appropriate and how best to use them.Arts and Humanities Research Counci

Assessment as the site of power:A Bourdieusian interrogation of service user and carer involvement in the assessments of social work students

The centrality of service user and carer involvement in social work education in England is now well established, both in policy and practice. However, research evidence suggests their involvement in student assessments is underdeveloped and under researched. This study focused on the positioning of service users and carers in relation to other stakeholders involved in the assessments of social work students in England. Using narrative research methodology, 21 participants, including service users, carers, social work students, social work employers and social work educators, were offered a semi-structured individual interview. Participants’ narratives revealed different power relations among those involved in social work students’ assessments and a lack of confidence among service users and carers in making failed assessment recommendations. The paper concludes by arguing the case for social work educators and service user organisations to provide joint training to support service users and carers in their role as assessors of social work students

MeerKLASS: MeerKAT Large Area Synoptic Survey

We discuss the ground-breaking science that will be possible with a wide area survey, using the MeerKAT telescope, known as MeerKLASS (MeerKAT Large Area Synoptic Survey). The current specifications of MeerKAT make it a great fit for science applications that require large survey speeds but not necessarily high angular resolutions. In particular, for cosmology, a large survey over $\sim 4,000 \, {\rm deg}^2$ for $\sim 4,000$ hours will potentially provide the first ever measurements of the baryon acoustic oscillations using the 21cm intensity mapping technique, with enough accuracy to impose constraints on the nature of dark energy. The combination with multi-wavelength data will give unique additional information, such as exquisite constraints on primordial non-Gaussianity using the multi-tracer technique, as well as a better handle on foregrounds and systematics. Such a wide survey with MeerKAT is also a great match for HI galaxy studies, providing unrivalled statistics in the pre-SKA era for galaxies resolved in the HI emission line beyond local structures at z > 0.01. It will also produce a large continuum galaxy sample down to a depth of about 5\,$\mu$Jy in L-band, which is quite unique over such large areas and will allow studies of the large-scale structure of the Universe out to high redshifts, complementing the galaxy HI survey to form a transformational multi-wavelength approach to study galaxy dynamics and evolution. Finally, the same survey will supply unique information for a range of other science applications, including a large statistical investigation of galaxy clusters as well as produce a rotation measure map across a huge swathe of the sky. The MeerKLASS survey will be a crucial step on the road to using SKA1-MID for cosmological applications and other commensal surveys, as described in the top priority SKA key science projects (abridged).Comment: Larger version of the paper submitted to the Proceedings of Science, "MeerKAT Science: On the Pathway to the SKA", Stellenbosch, 25-27 May 201

The Arts in Environmental Dialogue and Communication in West and East Africa

Les premières publications sur la délibération environnementale partaient du principe que les pairs débattaient rationnellement des preuves pour parvenir à des conclusions logiques. Cependant, des travaux plus récents présentent les activités artistiques comme un moyen de reconnaître les dimensions émotionnelles comme essentielles aux processus délibératifs. Simultanément, la littérature sur l'art participatif, l'art communautaire, l'activisme culturel et l'éducation artistique, regroupés sous le terme « arts pour le changement », montre comment les activités artistiques peuvent transmettre des messages au public et provoquer des changements. Notre étude a exploré le rôle des arts dans les délibérations à travers une série d'ateliers au Sénégal, au Mali, en Mauritanie, au Ghana et au Kenya. Des acteurs politiques, des activistes communautaires, des chercheurs et des artistes ont collaboré à la création d'oeuvres d'art. Les discussions des participants précédant l'utilisation d'activités artistiques ont montré que les discussions politiques sont déjà fortement influencées par les émotions, les croyances et les systèmes de valeurs, bien qu'elles ne soient souvent pas reconnues comme contribuant de manière significative à l'élaboration des politiques. La principale contribution de la création artistique collaborative a été de créer une atmosphère amicale qui a facilité les relations de travail. C'était particulièrement le cas lorsque les participants se réunissaient autour des fonctions de communication des oeuvres d'art produites, comme l'expriment les « arts pour le changement », plus courants dans les contextes d'Afrique de l'Est et de l'Ouest que les délibérations dirigées par les arts. L'accent mis sur la communication a mis en évidence l'importance d'animateurs artistiques compétents sur le plan esthétique. La facilitation doit également respecter les hiérarchies existantes tout en permettant à tous les participants de contribuer. Des recherches plus approfondies sur le rôle de la création artistique collaborative peuvent être menées dans le cadre d'une recherche-action.This paper contains an English Executive Summary on page 8. Early publications on environmental deliberation assumed that peers rationally debate evidence to reach logical conclusions. However, more recent works suggest that artistic activities are a way to recognise emotional dimensions as essential to deliberative processes. At the same time, literature on participatory art, community art, cultural activism and arts education, collectively referred to as ‘arts for change’, shows how artistic activities can convey messages to the public, and thereby provoke changes. Our study explored the role of the arts in deliberation through a series of workshops in Senegal, Mali, Mauritania, Ghana, and Kenya.Arts & Humanities Research Counci

A Large Sky Survey with MeerKAT

We discuss the ground-breaking science that will be possible with a wide area survey, using the MeerKAT telescope, known as MeerKLASS (MeerKAT Large Area Synoptic Survey). The current specifications of MeerKAT make it a great fit for cosmological applications, which require large volumes. In particular, a large survey over ~4,000 deg^2 for ~4,000 hours will potentially provide the first ever measurements of the baryon acoustic oscillations using the 21cm intensity mapping technique, with enough accuracy to impose constraints on the nature of dark energy. The combination with multi-wavelength data will give unique additional information, such as the first constraints on primordial non-Gaussianity using the multi-tracer technique, as well as a better handle on foregrounds and systematics. The survey will also produce a large continuum galaxy sample down to a depth of 5 µJy in L-band, unmatched by any other concurrent telescope, which will allow to study the large-scale structure of the Universe out to high redshifts. Finally, the same survey will supply unique information for a range of other science applications, including a large statistical investigation of galaxy clusters, and the discovery of rare high-redshift AGN that can be used to probe the epoch of reionization as well as produce a rotation measure map across a huge swathe of the sky. The MeerKLASS survey will be a crucial step on the road to using SKA1-MID for cosmological applications, as described in the top priority SKA key science projects

A Multicriteria Analysis of Groundwater Development Pathways in Three River Basins in Sub-Saharan Africa

Reliance on groundwater in Sub-Saharan Africa is growing and expected to rise as surface water resource variability increases under climate change. Major questions remain about how groundwater will be used, and who informs these decisions. We represent different visions of groundwater use by ‘pathways’: politically and environmentally embedded socio-technological regimes for governing and managing groundwater systems. We presented policy actors (9 sets), development and research stakeholders (4 sets), and water users (6 sets) in three river basins in Ethiopia, Niger and Tanzania with information on the social and environmental impacts of six ‘Groundwater Development Pathways’, before gathering their opinions on each, through Multicriteria Mapping (MCM). Participants preferred pathways of low-intensity use, incorporating multiple agricultural, pastoral and domestic purposes, to high-intensity single-use pathways. Water availability and environmental sustainability, including water quality, were central concerns. Participants recognised that all groundwater uses potentially impinge upon one another affecting both the quantity and quality of abstracted water. Across participant groups there was ambiguity about what the most important water use was; each expressed demands for more detailed, certain modelling data. Water users preferred community or municipal-scale management regimes, perceiving that water quality was more likely to be safeguarded by institutions at these levels, whereas policy and development actors preferred individual-scale management, viewed as more efficient in terms of operation and maintenance. We conclude that MCM, combined with more detailed modelling, can provide an effective framework for policy actors to understand other stakeholders’ perspectives on groundwater development futures, enabling equitable, inclusive decision-making and governance