Doctoral Degrees (Social Work)

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Social Work) by browse.metadata.advisor "Strydom, Marianne"

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    Assessment in child protection services: challenges faced by social workers
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-03) Ndonga, Moreblessing Memory; Strydom, Marianne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Social Work.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Assessment is the first step in child protection service rendering after a case of possible child abuse and neglect is reported. This assessment is the basis upon which important decisions should be made regarding what actions to take to protect children from abuse and neglect. It is therefore an important part of the task of the social worker in child protection practice worldwide. In South Africa, the execution of assessment in child protection services is paramount in the realisation of the rights of children to care and protection as advocated for in international, regional, and domestic policies and legislation. Despite the importance of assessment in the delivery of child protection services, it remains an under-researched area of enquiry when it comes to daily challenges faced by social workers in executing assessments in child protection services with children and families in South Africa. Hence the goal of this study was to gain an understanding of the challenges that social workers experience in assessment practice in child protection services in the South African context. The rights-based perspective and ecological perspective were chosen as the theoretical frameworks for this study. This study employed a qualitative research approach. It was an exploratory and a descriptive study, within a purposive sample selection of 18 social workers and 5 social work supervisors employed in 3 designated NGOs in the Cape Town area. The primary research instrument utilised in this study was the semi-structured interview schedule, which was developed based on themes emerging from literature. Six themes were derived from the participant interviews by way of thematic analysis. These themes were then further divided into subthemes and categories. The study revealed that when social workers undertake assessments, they are faced with challenges relating to the implementation of tools and challenges in organisations, communities and families that they work in. Many of the challenges that social workers face in regards to the implementation of assessment tools are due to a lack of knowledge and understanding of assessment tools which is linked to a lack of formal and refresher training on the implementation of those tools. As a consequence of the lack of formal training, social work supervisors have been burdened to provide informal training to enable social workers in their organisations to implement assessment tools. It is clear from the study’s findings that there is a strong focus on the implementation of the actuarial-based risk assessment tool which is a standardised scoring tool and that there is a lack of implementation of the consensus-based assessment tool which is the assessment triangle adopted from the United Kingdom. The lack of utilisation of the consensus-based assessment tool seems to impact the ability of social workers to complete comprehensive assessments in relation to alleged child abuse and neglect cases. The findings in this study also revealed that there is a strong emphasis on the implementation of the Children’s Act 38 of 2005 and therefore, professional steps in assessment are not being implemented. This lack of implementation of steps in assessment has been linked to a lack of time due to high caseloads, shortage of organisational resources, shortage of resources, violence in communities, low educational levels in families, and a lack of experience and training of social workers in the implementation of assessment tools and procedures in child protection. Thus, it seems that current assessment practices, including strategies utilised in assessments, are possibly not tailored to the reality of the South African context and therefore pose further challenges to the execution of assessments. It can be concluded that the ability to execute comprehensive assessments will not improve without the improvement of community resources (facilities) and organisational resources (cars, computers, office space, funds and manpower). These resources are necessary to improve the delivery of social services, including the execution of assessments with children and families in order to protect the rights of children to care and protection. Apart from having to address the issue of resources, it is recommended that social workers be provided with sufficient training concerning the implementation of assessment tools and procedures in child protection. Finally, there could be also a need to revise and adapt the current assessment tools to suite the South African context.
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    The challenges experienced by unemployed youth graduates in Botswana: An ecological systems perspective
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2022-04) Sebidie, Godfrey; Strydom, Marianne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Social Work.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Education has always been recognised as the means to achieve change, create new ideas, initiate new practices and move towards increasing prosperity. Thus, in many developing countries, tertiary education is increasingly important in facilitating a move into employment as part of an effort to increase prosperity. In Botswana, however, recent evidence suggests that graduates from the country’s tertiary institutions find it difficult to penetrate the labour market. Youth unemployment, especially graduate unemployment, has become a national concern in Botswana. It is normal for young graduates to expect to have a thriving career, yet, when these expectations are not met, unemployed graduates may face challenges in adapting to their situation. To deal with unemployment of youth graduates, the Botswana government established numerous youth intervention initiatives and programmes. However, past and current youth intervention programmes have been unable to mitigate unemployment, resulting in many youth graduates not being employed, some for as long as 10 years. Being unemployed has given rise to Botswana youth graduates having to face many challenges as their unemployed status has influenced their lives in various ways. It was established that, in Botswana, there was no general research or research from a social work perspective on the challenges that unemployed youth graduates were experiencing, which highlighted the possibility of a lack of appropriate services available to unemployed youth graduates. The ecological systems perspective was utilised to illustrate how various factors were interacting on the different systems of the ecological systems theory, as well as how these factors were affecting unemployed youth graduates. The ecological systems perspective was applied as it indicates how people encounter different environments throughout their lives that may influence their behaviour in different ways. A qualitative research approach together with exploratory and descriptive research designs were used to explore the challenges experienced by unemployed youth graduates in Botswana from an ecological systems perspective. Data was gathered through purposive and snowball sampling from the Unemployment Movement of Botswana and programme officers within the Ministry of Youth Empowerment Sport and Culture Development (MYESCD). Individual face-to-face, semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions were executed as data collection instruments. The research project took place in two phases. The first phase involved twenty unemployed youth graduates and the second phase entailed having two focus group discussions with eight programme officers from the MYESCD who had been working with unemployed youth graduates in the second phase. In total 28 participants took part in the study. Seven themes were then extracted from the participant interviews by way of thematic analysis. These themes were then further divided into subthemes and categories. It was found that unemployed youth graduates were experiencing challenges on the micro-, meso- and macro-levels of the ecological perspective. These challenges included psychological issues, for example, loss of self-esteem, sleeping disorders, depression and harbouring thoughts of suicide, physical challenges such as heart problems, headaches, and high blood pressure, as well as financial challenges such as not being able to provide for their loved ones, and being dependent on extended families. It was found that social work services were needed for unemployed youth graduates in order to promote their human dignity and rights. It is recommended that the Botswana government evaluate existing youth intervention government initiatives and programmes to determine the effectiveness thereof. It is also recommended that the government of Botswana should review the National Youth Policy of 2010 in order to adapt it to include and address current challenges experienced by unemployed youth graduates. Finally, it is recommended that needs assessment should be done to come up with programmes that are relevant and applicable to unemployed youth graduates of Botswana and that are not implemented one-size-fits all programmes.
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    The rights of child-headed households to care and protection: reflections of role players on social service delivery
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2024-03) Diago, Niccoh ; Strydom, Marianne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Social Work.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Across the world, there are many children who are left behind in child-headed households by their parents due to socio-economic challenges, illness, death, or general neglect. In South Africa, children living in child-headed households not only have to cope with going through life without their caregivers; they are also vulnerable to violence, abuse, crime, and a lack of social services. However, in terms of South African legislation and international treaties, social workers must ensure that child-headed households are cared for and protected. It was established that, in South Africa, there was no general research or research from a social work perspective on the rights of children in child-headed households to care and protection or about social services delivered to such households. This indicated that there was a possible lack of appropriate social services available to children living in child-headed households, which thus formed the topic of this study. In order to highlight the injustice, inequality, and poverty of child-headed households as well as how they are marginalised or excluded in society, the human rights-based perspective was applied in this study. This approach also served as a guide in the implementation of remedial strategies. To identify the possible services that should be rendered to child-headed households, based on the identified circumstances, the ecological systems perspective was further utilised. With this study a qualitative research approach was applied as it was an exploratory and a descriptive study within a purposive sample selection of seventeen social workers and five social worker supervisors in Limpopo, Mpumalanga, and Eastern Cape and one designated person of the provincial Department of Social Development. The primary research instrument utilised in this study and that was based on themes emerging from literature, was the semistructured interview schedule. Ten themes were derived from the participant interviews by way of thematic analysis. These themes were then further divided into subthemes and categories. The study revealed that children living in child-headed households were exposed to emotional difficulties and traumatic situations due to the loss of their parents, sexual abuse, and them having to assume adult responsibilities. It became clear that these children needed emotional support and nurturing households as well as counselling services. It was brought to light that other services, such as appointing adult caregivers and rendering family counselling services were difficult to deliver to these children due to social workers’ high caseloads and lack of resources such as vehicles. It was also found that these children received minimal support from extended families and as a result they were socially burdened and would engage in underage drinking and smoking, drop out of school, and in the case of girls, were vulnerable to early teenage pregnancy. It was revealed that, as these children were exposed to poverty and food deprivation and lived in inadequate shelters they needed sufficient income, sustainable food packages and adequate shelter. It was further found that child-headed households could not be regarded as a protective measure, as this form of household did not consider the best interests of these children because many of their rights were being infringed upon. This was exacerbated due to social workers who found it increasingly difficult to deliver social services to child-headed households as these social workers were exposed to multiple challenges, such as high caseloads, staff shortages, transportation shortages and limited funding. It is recommended that sufficient funding be provided to designated child welfare non-profit organisations and that more social workers should be employed to ensure that effective social services are delivered to children living in child-headed households. Finally, due to the grave and difficult circumstances that children of child-headed households are exposed to, there seems to be a need to revise and adapt the current legislation and consider children living in child-headed households to be children in need of care and protection in line with section 150(1) of the Children’s Act of South Africa.
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    Social work services to families caring for adult relatives with a mental illness
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-03) September, Uwarren; Strydom, Marianne; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Social Work.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: When families take care of a relative with a mental illness, it can cause tremendous stress to the family and the patient. Rendering social work services to such families would relieve stress and contribute to everyone’s quality of life. Globally, about one in four families has a relative with a mental illness, and with limited access to and limited resources, families must often look after and care for such relatives. Families must thus contend with multiple sources of stress, including stress relating to their relative's mental illness, symptoms and behaviours, and societal stigmatisation. If support services to families caring for adult relatives with a mental illness are limited or unavailable, families and their relatives with mental illness, suffer. Unfortunately, this is the situation in South Africa where the National Mental Health Policy Framework and Strategic Plan (Department of Health, 2012) and the Mental Health Care Act 17 of 2002, are in support of deinstitutionalising mental health patients. This means that patients should be discharged from mental institutions as soon as reasonably possible to be treated in their communities. Nationally, however, South Africa’s existing mental health frameworks are confronted by numerous challenges, such as the exchange of care of patients from institutions to community-based care, political contemplations in developing policy, stigmatisation of people with mental health issues, and a lack of community-based services. These challenges all directly impact families taking care of a relative with mental illness. Due to an unrelenting increase in people experiencing mental illnesses and the number of families reporting such problems, the demand for and necessity of rendering social work services to families taking care of an adult relative with a mental illness have been emphasised. Apart from the increasing demand for rendering direct social work services to families who take care of people with mental illness, there is also a lack of, or poor and rarely available community-based social work services to families of mentally ill relatives. Amid the drive for deinstitutionalisation and the subsequent focus on community-based mental health services in South Africa, there is insufficient empirical research regarding social work services rendered to families caring for a relative with a mental illness. Existing research does not specify social work services to families caring for a relative with a mental illness but focus mostly on interventions for the mentally ill individual.