MAKING SOCIAL WORK TRAINING COMMUNITY BASED

1. MAKING SOCIAL WORK TRAINING COMMUNITY BASED Lessons from Kerala, India Palakkappillil J.

2. CRITIQUE OF SOCIAL WORK TRAINING & PRACTICE • ‘Social Work’ is often equated to ‘voluntary work’, ‘social service’ or the kind of interventions made by a politician. • Social Work Training in India – since 1936 • More or less American in thinking and inputs • Past 70 years of professional Social Work

3. CRITIQUE OF SOCIAL WORK TRAINING & PRACTICE -2 • Copying the American Model • Training based on a ‘clinical’ and ‘residual’ approach to problem solving • The entire approach assumed an urban or urbanising community. • The reality of the rural India very minimally addressed.

4. CRITIQUE OF SOCIAL WORK TRAINING & PRACTICE -3 • Opportunities for Social Workers in the state welfare schemes – very minimal • Very minimum influence on policy formulation • A sizeable section migrates to countries like – UK, US, Ireland, Australia and Newzeland. • A struggle between ‘activist idealism’ and ‘worker pragmatism’

5. EXPERIMENTS IN MAKING COMMUNITY THE BASE • Premise: Community and its needs should form the basis of training and practice • As opposed to learning ‘methods’ out of community contexts

6. EXPERIMENT 1 – A PPP in Poverty Alleviation Mission • Context – Kerala, the most literate state, said to be a ‘development model’ • State Government’s Poverty Alleviation Mission. • Kutumbasree Mission (literally ‘Family Prosperity) • An MoU with the Mission for student trainee participation

7. Kutumbasree Mission • Identification of the poor – 9 point index* • Organising the poor in their neighbourhoods (NHG) • Women of the neighbourhood as the focus of community organisation • Training for initiating IGPs through SHGs

8. The Role of Social Work Trainees • Designation: Voluntary Executives of Kutumbasree (VEK) • Access to communities and documents in a semi-official capacity • Upgradation of units lagging behind • Improvement in performance through training • Identifying training needs.

9. The Role of Social Work Trainees -2 • Sorting out conflicts • Liaising with the Local Administration in the implementation of various schemes

10. Implications for Social Work Training • Making training more community based • Direct access to community – its needs, and resources • Direct access to a government programme • Practice of the various methods of Social Work - Work with Individuals, Groups and Communities within a given community • Possibilities for auxilliary methods

11. Implications for Social Work Training -2 • Familiarisation with policy implications • Understanding the need for political action • Remarkable improvement in the efficiency of the programme • Replicated all over the state.

12. EXPERIMENT 2 • Premise: Social Workers are to be change agents. • Practice Experience: Social Workers function as system maintenance workers

13. Involvement in People’s Struggles • The New Development Scenario • Development induced displacements • Dams, High Ways, Speed ways, SEZ

14. Involvement in People’s Struggles -2 • Visits to the affected communities • Interaction with the leaders of the struggles • Providing the people in struggle a space for expression. • Expressions of solidarity – joining a sit in, fast, or protest march (voluntary)

15. Impact on Training • Getting to know the seamy side of development • Awareness about rights – rights beyond the framework of client rights in services. • Possibilities of Social Action for change

16. EXPERIMENT 3: Livelabs • Concept of live labs • Field action projects in child protection & child rights; women’s empowerment and development; community based experiments in the care of the aging; natural resources management and conservation

17. Impact on Training • The growth of the school from a teaching centre to a centre of teaching and practice. • Possibilities of direct interaction with many practitioners • Association with various practice units • Involvement in various community based programmes (especially through camps)

18. Impact on Social Work Training • Help in familiarising the trainees with the actual context of practice. • Adapting the established methods to community context with a fair amount of success.

19. Implications for Social Work Practice • Immense possibilities of research • Need for theory building • Need for evolving new methods for a development context • Need for greater focus on social policy – a much neglected area by SW profession.

20. THANK YOU • MERCI

21. 9 Point Poverty Index : Urban Revised 2000 onwards • Dilapidated House / No house • Less than 5 cents of Land / No Land • No Sanitary Latrine • No access to safe drinking water within 150 meters • Women headed house hold • No regular employed person in the family • Socially Disadvantaged Groups SC/ST • Mentally retarded / Disabled / Chronically ill member in the family • Families without colour TV A family having at least four of the above factors is classified as a ‘Family at Risk’ or a ‘Poor Family’

22. 9 Point Poverty Index (Revised - Rural) • No Land /Less than 10 cents of Land • No house/Dilapidated House • No Sanitary Latrine • No access to safe drinking water within 300 meters • Women headed house hold/ Presence of a widow, divorcee / abandoned lady / unwed mother • No regularly employed person in the family • Socially Disadvantaged Groups(SC/ST) • Presence of Mentally or physically challenged person / Chronically ill member in the family • Families with an illiterate adult member A family having at least four of the above factors is classified as a ‘Family at Risk’ or a ‘Poor Family’