The PSW arranges quarterly children’s social work briefings and bi-annual adult’s social work briefings that provide critical space for social workers to share their views with senior leaders and ensure important information is shared face to face with frontline social workers. The sessions also have a learning and development focus often chosen by social workers themselves. These have proved to be highly successful with social workers reporting that they are able to apply their learning to practice and generally state in feedback that everything presented is of use to their practice.
The fourth Annual Children and Adult’s Social Work Conference took place in March 2019 with a theme of Human Rights and Exploitation. Adults and Children’s social workers came together to increase their knowledge and improve their practice in relation to working with people affected by gang related activity, forced marriage, child sexual exploitation and people affected by drug and substance misuse.
Social workers heard a powerful keynote speech by Jasvinder Sanghera CBE, a survivor of forced marriage and the founder of Karma Nirvana, the award-winning charity that supports both men and women affected by honour-based abuse and forced marriage.
Chris Fox from West Midlands Police then spoke about County Lines and the crime of cuckooing, where drug dealers take over the home of a vulnerable person to use it as a base for drug dealing, before a series of workshops focused on child sexual exploitation, gangs and youth violence, substance misuse and modern slavery.
There was also the opportunity for social workers to share individual success stories about the work of the council’s Children and Young People’s (CYP) and Adult Social Care (ASC) services.
Many social workers stated in feedback that this was the best conference they had attended, they felt their knowledge around these issues had risen significantly, they found it helpful to hear more detail about the work undertaken by partner agencies in the City and felt inspired to continue their work in what can be a challenging profession.
In addition to the above, we also offer: