Challengers of Social Work Education in Sri Lanka
National Institute of Social Development
The premier institution in Social Work education in Sri Lanka.
shamini attanayaka School of Social Work, National Institute of Social Development , Sri Lanka
Abstract The aim of this article is to discuss challengers of Social Work education and the related issues in providing this education in Sri Lanka. Most Sri Lankan universities provide academic degree programmes which are knowledge oriented. The Sri Lanka School of Social Work at the National Institute of Social Development (NISD) is the only institution that provides Social Work professional education in this country up to now. After the war, Sri Lanka is facing a series of issues related to displace people. But the country is still not equipped to attend to these in a systematic manner as the human resource is untrained. NISD is not established as a University. It has lack of academic powers and facilities to be an educational institute. Public are not much aware of the degree awarding institutes and they consider it inferior to the universities. Though these academic programs are to train professional social workers lack of recognition to the profession of social work in the country affect the demand and the purpose of training. Challenges emerge, then, as to how to open up the dialogue and how the establishment of universal norms, institutional practices and views of people's behaviour and the nature of knowledge and scientific development in the search for the truth' as universal principles of social work which can be easily translated across cultural imperatives.
Keywords
#RoleoftheSocialWorkers #SocialWorkEducation #ChallengersofSocialWorkEducationinSriLanka
Introduction
The aim of this article is to discuss challengers of Social Work education and the related issues in providing this education in Sri Lanka. The social work education started in Sri Lanka in 1952. Though it has a long history the growth of social work education has been very slow and it is not expanded to all over the country yet. The Sri Lanka School of Social Work at the National Institute of Social Development, which is functioning under the purview of the Ministry of Social Empowerment and Welfare, is the only institution that provides professional social work education in the country. The social work education is conducted at the tertiary level.
Professional Education
Most of the degrees offered by the Sri Lankan Universities are academic in nature. This is more applicable with the degrees offered by the Faculties of Humanities and Social Sciences. The academic degrees are more knowledge oriented and not focused on developing skills and values to practice in a special area of practice. The professional education programmes are provided by few faculties in Sri Lanka. Some of them are the faculties of Medicine, Engineering, Law and Education. Some of the students in academic degrees follow professional courses conducted by other institutes after their graduation in seeking employment. The Medical College is a part of the university system but the Law College is not a part of the university system. The LLB is an academic degree and the graduates have to follow a three months practical course at the Law College for them to be qualified as Lawyers. The Charted Accountants, Charted Engineers and Architects are some of the professional institutes which offer professional education courses in their respective fields. Social Work education is coming under the category of professional education. The students train to work at different levels in order to empower and help people to find out their own solutions to the problems faced by them. The students are provided with necessary knowledge, skills and attitudes to work with individuals, families, groups, communities, welfare organizations and at social policy development.
Social Work Education in Sri Lanka
Social work Education was already mentioned that professional education for Social Work started in Sri Lanka in 1952. The Sri Lanka School of Social Work at the National Institute of Social Development (NISD), which is functioning under the purview of the Ministry of Social Empowerment and Welfare, is the only institution that provides Social Work professional education in this country up to now. This means social work education has been providing by the Sri Lanka School of Social Work for more than 60 years by now. After about 50 years it was recognized as a degree awarding institute. None of the Universities paid any attention to the field of social work until the Tsunami disaster happened in Sri Lanka in 2004. Most of the people do not understand the difference between Social Work and Sociology. Four universities have introduced some course units in Social Work in Sociology special degree courses. They are just introductory courses in Social Work. Social Work is a separate discipline, a field of study and a profession. It has its own internationally designated titles for degrees as Bachelor of Social Work and Master of Social Work. They are the basic qualifications to be registered as Professional Social Workers in most of the countries. The NISD conducts three levels of professional courses in Social Work. They are the Diploma in Social Work, Bachelor’s degree in Social Work and the Master’s degree in Social Work. The Diploma in Social Work commenced in 1978 as a full-time two year programme is conducted in local languages; Sinhala and Tamil. After the NISD was declared as a degree awarding institute by the UGC in 2005 it was empowered to conduct and afford Bachelor of Social Work degree. The BSW course was started in 2005 and the Masters in Social Work programme commenced in 2008.
The common features of the curricular of the three educational courses are that they consist of both theoretical learning at the classroom and the practical learning at the field. The theoretical knowledge provided in two major areas as understanding human behaviour and social work methods on working with individuals, families, groups, communities and organizations. The field work is organized by the Field work coordinator of the School of Social Work. There is a cadre of local supervisors trained by the school to supervise students. The students are placed in social welfare agencies to practice case management and group work and for community work. Some students are directly sent to the communities by the school and some are through NGOs who are having community work programmes.
Role of Social Workers in Sri Lanka
领英推荐
Sri Lanka has experienced rapid socioeconomic changes during the past. The prolonged civil war was over and the country is reawakening. The society will have more changes in the future with having more emphasis in economic development. It is inevitable that people have to adapt to these changes and those who cannot adapt to the situations will have to face with problems. There could be multiple reasons for the development of the problems. It is the role of the social scientists to study these situations, analyze and interpret the situations but the role of the social worker is to intervene at the situations of human interactions to find out solutions for the problems faced by the people for their well-being. Problems could be located with individuals, families, groups and communities. They could be related with lack of availability of service delivery systems or due to absence of social policies. Sri Lanka needs thousands and thousands of social workers to work in variety of field settings. They are required to work in institutions as well as in the communities. They have to engage in curative, preventive and developmental social work. Some of the institutions which need social workers are mental hospitals, schools, prisons, camps for displaced people and resettlement villages. Some of the categories of populations which need social work interventions are disable people, children, victims of the crimes, single women headed families, workers in the industries and people living under poverty.
At present there are about 2500 social workers trained by the Sri Lanka School of Social Work. However there is no system of registration and issuing licenses for social workers in the country to identify them as professional social workers. The Sri Lanka Association of Professional Social Workers has proposed to bring legislation through a Parliamentary bill to establish a Regulatory Body for Professional Social Workers in Sri Lanka. It is the duty of all to join hands with the association to bring it to a reality.
The Challenges
The Challenge before social work lays in the complexity of issues that Sri Lanka grapples with in the psychosocial shear which is clamoring for the need for social works, conservatively estimated to be around 30,000 for a total population of 20 million. Sri Lanka is a Developing country, after war thousands of displaced persons, and the list of serious social problem is disturbing. There are numerous groups undergoing severe hardship, excluded from the mainstream, denied basic human dignity, betrayed by the new economic arrangements for assistance. But the country is still not equipped to attend to these in a systematic manner as the human resource is untrained. This paper is intended to be an introduction to the hope that the teacher and the student may both benefit from the coverage of some theoretical material as these have not been made available to the Sri Lankan social workers. I have also attempted to contextualize the subject so that it may take a Sri Lankan flavor which I believe is essential. Western Social Work cannot be copied for an Asian society. Social and cultural arrangements are very different in Western models of practice. the types of social work practice even among the developed West, the relevant theory and delivery are varied Social workers role is associated with certain key terms and to name just a few, they are wellbeing, injustice, human dignity, and inclusivity. The social worker is mostly addressing the diseconomies of growth. In contemporary Sri Lankan society there are numerous individuals and group who are marginalized by the social and economic arrangements under which we all live.
NISD is not established as a University. It has lack of academic powers and facilities to be an educational institute. There is greater influence from the Ministry which is not aware of professional education. Public are not much aware of the degree awarding institutes and they consider it inferior to the universities. Other social science disciplines are engaged in similar activities. There is a tendency for other disciplines not to restrict themselves to their field of studies. Though these academic programs are to train professional social workers lack of recognition to the profession of social work in the country affect the demand and the purpose of training. Majority of the graduates find employment in non-government sector and some of them are employed in outside of the field of social work. There is no accreditation body or a system of registration for social workers in this country.
Conclusions
It has been an implicit assumption in this article that social work programs in the Asia-Pacific region exist in an increasingly diverse and heterogeneous world. Challenges emerge, then, as to how to open up the dialogue within the Asia-Pacific region and how the establishment of universal norms, institutional practices and views of people’s behaviour and the nature of knowledge and scientific development in the search for the truth’ as universal principles of social work which can be easily translated across cultural imperatives .Acknowledging that the Asia-Pacific region is a mass of cultural groups each with their own system of meaning, understanding, needs and purposes where no one particular group should have a privileged voice over the other can fracture the present social work discourse and open the way to explore multiple-realities. This will ensure that new subject positions are created. Further, continually challenging the academic authority over knowledge and the academic ‘game’ in which social work discourse is currently located will draw attention to social work’s arcane and specialized language as exclusionary and controlling and will raise the awareness as to social work’s complicates in social control and cultural imperialism (Healy 2000). This is important for developing countries as well as those beginning to formulate their social work programmes. Post-colonial social work demands the resurrection of lost voices in the midst of western dominance, while postmodern social work’s agenda is to encourage a multiplicity of visions not just one concerned with individual and social change and social justice, but one that reflects a more general concern for accepting differences, cultural diversity and inclusive dialogues. If further collaboration in revising global guidelines is mindful of these ideas then it will represent a positive move forward and unsettle previously established power relationships that have in the past dominated the development of social work programs in the Asia-Pacific region.
REFERENCES
Published on:
International Journal of Social Work and Human Services Practice Vol.4. No.5 November, 2016, pp. 118-120 by Horizon Research Publishing
*(ISSN: 2332-6840 (Online) 2332-6832 (Print) Copyright ? 2016 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License)