Increasing the Capacity for Quantitative Teaching in Social Work Undergraduate Courses

The proposed project would develop the capacity of social work academics across the country to teach quantitative research through a programme of 1-day introductory training sessions, two 3-day advanced courses which would be supplemented by follow-up participation in a small group focussed on putting learning into practice and production of online teaching resources to share and support learning for academics across the project. The proposal is intended to complement a parallel Curriculum Innovation project, but can stand alone. In phase 1 and 2 (2012-13) the RDI will focus on teaching and developing online resources for 3 pioneer Universities committed to developing the teaching of quantitative skills across undergraduate degrees in social work (Bath, Bedfordshire and Queen's Belfast). The aim is to provide specialist teaching in each year and simultaneously increase the use of quantitative data across all elements of the course. The project will therefore develop brief introductory workshops for all staff, and more advanced teaching and ongoing mentoring for lecturers taking the lead on quantitative teaching. In addition, an online web resource will be prepared for academics. During phase 1 this web-based facility will be developed in collaboration with the pioneer areas to bring together a variety of resources for academics, including teaching aides, assignments, key texts and interactive lesson plans or group activities. Phase 3 (2013-14) will involve the roll-out of teaching through three Introductory 1-day courses for up to 30 academics each and two advanced courses for up to 12 academics each. In addition, participants in the advanced courses will work in small groups facilitated by one of the co-applicants and focussed on putting learning into practice across the curriculum. Finally, in Phase 4 the web resources will be finally revised and made available to the whole of the social work academic community and the evaluation will be completed. The project will be primarily evaluated by comparing the knowledge and views of students and staff prior to the implementation of the changes, after the first year and then at the end of the RDI. The entire project offers exceptional value-for-money for the ESRC, as the commitment of staff and Universities allows the provision of training and resources at a fraction of their genuine cost. In addition, the Goldberg Centre undertakes to maintain and update the website on a regular basis until 2018 or beyond.

Social work is the lead discipline in the field of social care. UK expenditure on social care is in excess of £20 billion per year, with around 1.5 million people employed in the sector and more than 3 million receiving social care services. Social workers provide a particularly significant element of the workforce in this area as they tend to have managerial and budgetary control. Furthermore, a significant amount of social care research is led by or involves social work researchers. The current proposal therefore has the potential to have a significant positive impact beyond its capacity to provide for better educated social work researchers.
The proposals would lead to an increase in the number of social work practitioners who were quantitatively literate. This will contribute to social work practitioners having a more nuanced and thoughtful approach to research. It is particularly important for understanding research relating to what does or does not work in social work. It is also to be hoped that as these practitioners progress in their careers and move into senior professional and management positions their improved understanding of quantitative research designs and methodologies will allow them to be more discerning users of and commissioners of research.
In the medium to long term the proposal is intended to provide for more and better quality quantitative research within social work. This is particularly likely to increase the field of evaluative research. Research has suggested that by far the most common questions that social workers want answered related to what works, but that less than 4% of research studies address such questions. A project on this scale would not on its own address such a significant structural issue, but it would contribute to developing more researchers able to address such questions. In the long term it is hoped that such a body of research would benefit social workers (in that they would have a more robust evidence base for their interventions) and the people who use social work services.
The paths to such longer term impacts are complex. The proposed project would lead to more quantitatively literate social work graduates from the pioneer universities and other universities where staff take part in the advanced training and support. This alone is not an insignificant impact, with more than 200 graduates per year from the 3 pioneer sites and up to 1000 if the maximum of 20 other universities undertake significant changes. More generally it is hoped that given the current appetite within the social work academic community for action to address the lack of quantitative research capacity there will be a high use of the online resources and materials produced within the project.
The RDI proposal would be particularly likely to achieve significant impact if the accompanying CI proposal were funded. The CI proposal provides an opportunity to develop in depth a common shared curriculum for teaching quantitative research. The RDI project provides the perfect opportunity for sharing learning and resources developed during this process.