Social workers in school projects to be extended
Fiona Simpson
Wednesday, April 13, 2022
Funding for two projects which see social workers support schools has been extended until the end of the current academic year, What Works for Children’s Social Care (WWCSC) has announced.
WWSCS’s Social Workers in Schools (SWIS) programme and a programme that sees a social worker support and supervise designated safeguarding leads (DSLs) will be funded to run in areas across England until the end of the summer term.
The funding extension comes after the projects were scaled up in 2020, following a series of pilot programmes.
SWIS sees social workers placed in 21 schools in Wolverhampton, Croydon, Cumbria, Devon, Ealing, Gateshead, Haringey, Harrow, Hull, Lambeth, Merton, Newcastle, Salford, Somerset, Southwark, Staffordshire, Sutton, Swindon, Tameside, Tower Hamlets and the Wirral.
The supervision for DSL programme provides DSLs in schools with regular access to a social worker to discuss any issues or seek advice on situations relating to child safety within their school.
“The initiative aims to reduce DSL stress levels and anxiety, whilst also improving knowledge and understanding of children’s social care processes and issues,” WWCSC said, highlighting that one area of the programme has a particular focus on identifying and addressing child sexual abuse.
The new funding will also allow for the extension of the independent evaluations of the programmes, conducted by Cascade at Cardiff University, and NIESR.
The research is due to be published in January 2023.
Jermaine Ravalier, director of programmes, What Works for Children’s Social Care, said: “The funding extension for both SWIS and DSLs not only enables social workers to stay in their assigned schools longer and continue their work with children and young people, but will also enable us to gather more data and deepen our research, which in turn will provide richer evidence to evaluate and hopefully identify key outcomes to assist in supporting children, young people and their families.”
