Doctoral Degrees (Social Work)

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Social Work) by Subject "Child abuse -- Prevention"

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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.