Peter Unwin

University of Worcester | UW · Institute of Health and Society

The work placement experiences of MA and BA social work students at an English university during a pandemic were explored by way of an online survey. Thirteen students responded and reported that the moral and practical consequences of a sudden forced move to the “new normal” of online working and assessment raised serious issues about the boundary...

Key Practitioner Messages • Young people at risk of child sexual exploitation (CSE) value peer mentoring and will respond to services that they regard as authentic, consistent and tailored to their needs. • Practitioners should always endeavour to prioritise the voices of young people - they are articulate about CSE. • Arts‐based projects should b...

Background The literature regarding inclusion of service users and carers (SUACs) in the recruitment processes for future health and social work professionals has primarily presented such inclusion as positive for all. This study is novel in its exploration of the detail of SUACs' involvement and in its reach across a whole university department of...

Service users and carers’ (SUACs) inclusion in student selection days at English universities is accepted as standard practice, since such inclusion is mandated by a range of professional health and social work regulators. However, SUACs’ voices are little heard; this study addresses this knowledge gap for the first time. Student selection research...

This essential new textbook meets the challenges faced by those who work with children in order to provide safe and effective practice. It identifies the ways in which social work and psychology need to work together to achieve this. Misca and Unwin reflect on the need for 'research mindedness' in social work education, and offer an invaluable crit...

Academic staff perceptions of the value and purpose of service user and carer (SUAC) involvement within a health and social work faculty in an English university were explored in this co-produced qualitative study. Relevant research findings over the past two decades were reviewed and two SUAC researchers, plus an academic member of staff, designed...

This article reports the findings of two small-scale qualitative studies at an English university which engaged service users and carers (SUACs) as researchers in co-production with an academic researcher. Findings were that SUAC participants reported considerable levels of self-transformation via involvement in training health and social work prof...

The following article presents a small-scale qualitative study in which the student learning experiences from service user and carer (SUAC) involvement in social work, mental health nursing and social welfare courses at an English university were evaluated for any effects on student perceptions, knowledge, skills and practice. Using focus group met...

Successful social work practice is underpinned by knowledge, theories and research findings from a range of related disciplines, key among which is psychology. This timely book offers a grounded and engaging guide to psychology s vital role at the heart of contemporary social work practice. The book skilfully addresses some of the central theoreti...

Service users and carers (SUAC) have made significant contributions to professional training in social work courses in Higher Education (HE) over the past decade in the UK. Such participation has been championed by government, academics and SUAC groups from a range of theoretical and political perspectives. Most research into the effectiveness of S...

The Coalition Government in England has recently undertaken a radical review of adoption services. Informed by business and managerial principles, the government strategy, ‘An Action Plan for Adoption: Tackling Delay’ (DfE, 2012a), is designed to increase the number of adoptions, widen the pool of adoptive applicants and reduce the costs occurred b...

Social work with children and families is constantly in the headlines and social workers' decisions are subject to ever increasing scrutiny at all levels. This aspirational book supports students and newly qualified social workers and suggests practical ways in which they might thrive, rather than just survive, in practice. The book tackles the dif...

This chapter discusses the rise and consolidation of performance management and its impact on social work in the United Kingdom, focusing on the era from 1945 to 1979, during which faith was placed in professionals as guarantors of the performance of welfare-state services, including social work. It reviews the New Right's erosion of professionals'...

Since the 1980s, social work in the United Kingdom has been increasingly subject to scrutiny and managerial control, a considerable body of literature having charted the shifts within state social work as it has changed from being a ‘bureau-profession’, a hybrid model accommodating both professional and bureaucratic ideologies, to being a professio...

stage of a project developing peer visitors for older people's residential care homes. Peer visitors are older people who volunteer to take on a role aimed at capturing a "peer" perspective on the qualitative aspects of living within a residential care home 1 , in contrast to the empirical and regulatory perspectives which various managerial and in...