Social Work Week 2023 will focus on shared experience
By Gemma Raw
‘Learn, connect and influence’ are the three keywords for this year's Social Work Week, a programme of events for those working in social care jobs or with lived experience of social work.
Curated by Social Work England, Social Work Week runs from 20 to 24 March and will feature a varied schedule of headline and sector-led sessions, including presentations by expert speakers, panel discussions and workshops. Social Work Week coincides with World Social Work Day on Tuesday 21 March, which brings together social workers from across the globe.
Key themes
This year’s Social Work Week focuses on three key themes:
Learn: the breadth of social work: lived, learned and professional experience
Connect: social work identity and sharing best practice
Influence: looking back at the past three years, and looking forward to what’s next for social work in England
Who is Social Work Week for?
Social Work Week events will be of interest to all kinds of people working in social care jobs, from frontline social workers to those in social care senior leadership roles, as well as people with lived experience of social work, and anyone with a professional interest in social care, such as regulators, educators and policymakers.
Headline sessions
Subjects covered in the Social Work Week headline sessions range from workforce reform and retention to transitional safeguarding. Here are just some of the highlights:
On Monday 20 March there will be a session reflecting on key social work staff issues, with a focus on retention and the future of the social care workforce. Topics will include workforce pressures, the role of agency workers, the relationship between social work and social care, and recruitment of the next generation of social workers.
Tuesday’s headline session will deal with the issue of racism in the social care workplace, in communities and in social work practice. On the agenda is a review of the findings of a survey of almost 2,000 social workers by the Anti-Racist Steering Group, which highlighted the toll racism is taking on social workers in England.
On Wednesday 22 March, the British Association of Social Workers’ Professional Officer Rebekah Pierre will be facilitating a session on smashing stereotypes in the social work profession.
The evening session on Thursday 23 March will be about improving social care with LGBTQ+ young people. It will include the sharing of new data from the LGBTQ+ Young People in Social Care (LYPSA) research project, led by the University of Birmingham in collaboration with What Works for Children’s Social Care.
The final headline session on Friday 24 March will host a reflective space to explore the value of co-production through stories. The session will also explore meaning, themes and ambiguity to help provide a collective, deeper understanding of the value of co-production.
To register for any of the events, visit the Social Work Week web portal and click on the link for headline programme or sector-led sessions.
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