evidencing the outcomes of professional education: a perspective from social work elaine sharland,...
TRANSCRIPT
Evidencing the outcomes of professional education: a perspective from social
work
Elaine Sharland, Professor of Social Work Researchon behalf of
Suzy Braye, Professor of Social Work University of Sussex
Understanding Teacher Learning: Seminar 14th March 2013
The political context for developments over 10 years
UK wide “what-works” focus
Government investment in
the new degree-level
initial qualification
SCIE remit to develop the
evidence base for social care
Continued and developing debates on
what constitutes evidence
Political focus on professional
education arising from child death enquiries
How did this take shape nationally?
Funding for a series of knowledge
reviews in core curriculum areas, each comprising:
(a) Systematic review of the
literature(b) Practice survey
Human growth & development, mental health
and disability
Assessment, planning, intervention and review
Communication skills
Law
Partnership working
PLUS, based on the findings, a series of Resource Guides and
E-learning Resources were published
The knowledge reviewswww.scie.org.uk
So far, so good, but …
The OSWE Project: Evaluating the Outcomes of Social Work Education
A push for a ‘more robust’ evidence base for professional education
Quantifiable outcomes Impact on professional practice
The KRs sourced evidence of a particular kindQualitative research
Descriptive accounts of
education practice
Perceived and experienced outcomes
“The poor quality of research design of many studies, together with the limited information provided in the published accounts are major problems in establishing an evidence base for social work education” (Carpenter 2005, p.4)
The OSWE project
Implementation of approaches outlined in Carpenter (2005):
http://www.scie.org.uk/publications/misc/evalreport.pdf* provides a conceptual basis for discussion of learning outcomes * outlines a range of methods for evaluating them
A learning set for social work educators that aimed to:
* develop participants’ methodological expertise in research design that will measure outcomes* enhance the evidence base to inform educators’ choice of approaches to professional learning in social work
Completion of the project
Learning set results published - Burgess and Carpenter (2010): http://www.swap.ac.uk/docs/monograph2_oswe.pdf
“The project shows that it is possible to measure learning and that this approach can be used to refine teaching to maximise learning” (Moira Gibb, foreword).
Mixed results
Progress in outcome measures
Challenges remain in research design
Replication of the ‘collaborative capacity building’/learning set
approachEvidence on the value and challenges of the collaborative capacity building/learning set approach in motivating and supporting innovation in learning strategies
http://www.scie.org.uk/publications/elearning/files/EvaluationSummary.pdf Full report also available
Key issues going forward
•There is some way to go in order to build a robust evidence base on social worker learning
•There is emerging evidence of impact on knowledge, skill and attitude development
•Research designs that improve attributional reliability are needed
•Research designs that provide evidence of impact on professional behaviour in practice, and service user remain a challenge
•A collaborative capacity building approach can be effective in improving knowledge and confidence in evaluating outcomes