Service User and Carer Participation in Social Work

Service User and Carer Participation in Social Work Identify, using examples, how a professional social worker should work in such a way as to ensure user and carer participation. Consider the practice issues for working anti-oppressively with users or carers who are either a  frail elderly person and their carer. A professional social worker must approach the elderly person as an individual and ensure that individual as opposed to generic needs are assessed. In practical terms this means that the approach taken is built upon a mix of professional pragmatism and textbook rules. This manner of approach also ensures that the social worker can approach the practice issues identified in an anti-oppressive and professional manner which promotes both user and carer participation. Certainly in terms of personal reflection, and from the writer’s perspective; as a white, middle class person, integrating the theory of how one is required to engage oneself anti-oppressively, in the capacity of social worker with the pragmatics of good social skills and an ability to put a user, such as a frail elderly person and their carer at ease is all the more important where there are differences between the practitioner and the service user in terms of age, race, religion and sex to name just a few examples. Therefore promoting user and carer participation and working anti oppressively with frail elderly users is by no means an easy task. Such a task requires an understanding of models of oppression. Models of oppression mainly relate to the ‘isms’ within society such as ageism, sexism, classism, racism and many others (Williams, (2002) 1), and in the context of this question perhaps ageism and its avoidance within a user/practitioner setting is the most relevant. The professional social worker must be aware that models of oppression must be understood and applied within carer/user settings in order to promote an ethical, participatory relationship between the two (Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust (2006) 14). This is because as Beckett and Maynard ((2005) 46) observe, the social worker often deals with those groups within society who are the ‘least powerful’. One classic example of this for the social worker in a practice situation could be at a juncture where a frail elderly person reaches a stage where their needs cannot be accommodated at home, and supported accommodation options for the elderly person may need to be discussed. In this instance ‘alone time’ spent between carer and the social worker and the user and the social worker can allow both to discuss the issues at hand frankly, and decide what the best way forward might be. This ensures that there is holistic user participation, as it is important that the needs of a frail elderly person are not entirely overshadowed by the input of the carer. This by no means implies that the carer should be ignored during a home visit, or should be excluded in any manner, but there will be times when it is appropriate for the frail elderly person (provided they are compos mentis) to express their viewpoint independently of those close to them (for example if they express a wish t o have arrangements made for a will). This will also give the social worker an opportunity to have some time alone with the carer, which gives the carer an opportunity to raise concerns or to discuss issues which they would perhaps not feel comfortable raising in the presence of the person who they take care of. Of course, the user participation will be important once these discussions have taken place, because a frail elderly person cannot be placed into supported accommodation without their co-operation and consent. However, it is often beneficial, where a sensitive issue should as a move between home and supported accommodation is to be broached, that a carer and a professional social worker have an opportunity to discuss the needs of the ‘user’ of the services in a setting where these issues can be spoken of frankly. This does not mean that issues should be concealed from a user or from a carer, but often in terms of facilitating anti-oppressive practice issues it i s appropriate to relate to both user and carer in different ways, and therefore it may be necessary to communicate with one or another (user and carer) separately. In this context the issue of power within society and how it relates to social inequalities must be understood. The social worker is in quite a powerful position compared to an elderly and frail service user, and therefore a professional social worker is required to appreciate how their language must be employed as a strategy to engage the service user, and carer anti oppressively, and at the same time promoting participation. To take stock of another example to illustrate this point, let us look at a scenario whereby an elderly person who is frail is hostile to interventions from a social worker. Here, the requirements for anti-oppressive techniques of care become all the more important. Difficult questions become apparent in this context. Some examples are as follows: What should one do whereby a frail elderly person has a carer who looks after their needs on a part time basis, and the social worker feels that there are issues of self neglect during episodes where the carer is not present? To take this example a little further, a scenario could arise where a frail elderly person, whose carer is not present, is being visited by a social worker. Let us imagine that the social worker wishes to gain entry to the house of the elderly frail person in order to assess their needs and the elderly person is suspicious and does not wish to allow the person in. How can language be employed in this setting to promote an ethical relationship based on anti-oppressive techniques in this scenario? A simple answer would be for the social worker firstly to explain who they are and why they wish to pay a visit to the elderly person, and secondly another strategy which could be employed would be to say to the service user (the elderly frail person); Can I come in for a Chat/some Tea?, rather then an overly formal explanation of why they are there for example ‘I have to speak to you to assess whether you are capable of looking after yourself’. This approach also empowers the service user, since they may feel more in control of the interaction, and they might also be more inclined to perceive the social worker on friendly terms. To pose another critically important question here: how should a social worker in this above outlined scenario handle a conflict which arises between an elderly user and the state where an elderly person, who lacks capacity to make decisions for themselves is self-neglecting and will not co-operate with a social worker who encourages them to move into supported accommodation? Two models of intervention may be employed here by the social worker, to deal with the conflict. One is the state intervention model, which may involve sectioning the frail elderly person and removing them into the care of an institution, and alternatively the social worker can choose to employ more moderate interventions which involve living support from voluntary sector groups (Scottish Executive (2006) Section 1.3). Which one is best always depends upon the individual circumstances of the frail elderly person, and the judgement of the individual social worker[1]. In this context, and to continue the reference to the particular example where a social worker wishes to gain entry to the house of a frail, elderly person for the purposes of assessing their needs, it is also important to remember that the social worker owes the frail elderly person some legal responsibilities. All social work practitioners, for example are required to adhere to the various codes of ethics which have been issued through the General Social Care Council, which was set up in 2001. Amongst other duties, each of the 84000 social workers and social worker students on the Social Care Register must submit to inspection by the Commission for Social Care Inspection, and are required to have their own copies of their codes of conduct; and also as of 2003, the Social Care Register requires that only registered social workers may describe themselves as social workers (to label oneself a social worker, and at the same time intending to deceive others in this respect is now a crim inal offence) (www.gscc.org.uk). Another legal responsibility which the professional service user owes to the user and to the carer is the duty not to discriminate unnecessarily against a person on the grounds of their race, ethnicity, disability, and age to give just a few examples of areas which are protected by law by anti-discrimination legalisation. Research into what practice issues are important for services users including carers and the elderly which was carried out by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust suggests that the combating of discrimination and how it can lead to an oppressive relationship between service user and social worker is very important in social work practice (Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust (2006) 14). In terms of both user and carer participation, the issue of confidentiality is of the utmost importance. This builds trust between user and the social work practitioner and also may lead to a feeling of empowerment by the service user, who is in the context of this question a frail elderly person. To refer back to the first example used in this essay (where the issue of perhaps assessing the needs and views of both carer and an elderly frail person separately has been raised); where there are issues which are quite sensitive between a carer, and a frail elderly person, it is important that the confidence of both parties are respected by the social worker. It is also important to speak to each person on their terms. One classic example of this in the context of a frail elderly person, addressing the user firstly by using their formal title ‘Miss Jones’ for example or ‘Mrs Smith’, as opposed to the use of first names is potentially an important strategy to emp loy. It is often the case that there will be a large generational gap between the frail elderly person and the social worker, and this makes to concept of anti-oppressive techniques and participation techniques all the more important. Such a generational gap may make a frail elderly person perceive the social worker as more of a threat to them, and may perhaps convey to them the impression that the social worker has little understanding of their needs and view of the world. In this sense, also good case management and record keeping (often a legal requirement for social workers) will also facilitate user and carer participation, as well as anti-oppressive practices. In conclusion therefore there are a plethora of practice issues which are pivotal in a scenario where a social worker is required to interact in a professional capacity with a frail elderly person and their carer. All of these issues are intersecting, related, and sometimes contingent upon each other. The requirements for user and carer participation and for an understanding of anti-oppressive techniques are therefore complex concepts which require a pragmatic approach, integrated with a theoretical approach on the part of the contemporary professional social worker. These arguments have been supported throughout the essay through a focus upon reflective and theoretical reasoning. Bibliography Books Beckett, C. and Maynard, A. (2005) Values and Ethics in Social Work. Publisher: Sage Publications. Place of Publication: UK. Articles Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust (2006) Strategy for Social Work and Social Care. Publisher: Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust. Place of Publication: UK. Scottish Executive (2006) The Need for Social Work Intervention. Publisher: Scottish Executive. Place of Publication: UK. Williams, C. (2002) A Rationale for an Anti-Racist Entry Point to Anti-Oppressive Social Work in Mental Health Services Critical Social Work, 2002 Vol. 3, 1. Website http://www.gscc.org.uk/News+and+events/Media+releases/Put+social+care+centre+stage+in+social+exclusion+drive.htm >>. 1 Footnotes [1] See the Scottish Executive Publication for a more in depth account of models of intervention.

Malachi Stacks in the Matchmaker Essay

In the world of business there are always those men and women who are not recognized for the contributions they make to certain products, projects, or works even though without them the result would never exist. Nonetheless, these people go on with their daily lives working hard, knowing that all their dedication is going to benefit others and not them. Yet, they can’t blame the big companies for not being recognized, because these men and women do this willingly. They are fully aware that their actions serve a purpose to the greater rather than a personal one, and for them that is enough. Such people do not need the recognition of others because they themselves know the importance of their actions. One example of such a human being is portrayed in Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker. His name is Malachi Stacks, and though he only shows up on stage two or three times, he is the one who gives the entire production meaning. Malachi is the person who sets into motion a series of events that completely change not only the characters, but also their lives. With this character, Thornton Wilder takes what used to be just a regular farce comedy and gives it meaning which makes all the difference, Malachi Stacks makes all the difference. Thornton carefully crafted the role of Stacks in such a way that made him distinct from the rest of the characters. Even with being in his fifties, sadness and depression are entirely absent from his life. Every line spoken by him has a joyful feeling to, and almost puts a smile on the reader’s face. Even at times when he is being put down by Mr. Vandergelder, joy is felt in his words. Wilder makes Malachi seem like a little adolescent, who has not yet been exposed to reality, and still thinks the world is perfect. However, all this is just an image that Malachi establishes for his own purposes. He makes people believe he can be trusted by pretending to be respectful and following orders. Malachi creates a relationship between himself and the others, especially Mr. Vandergelder, which makes him seem gullible and easy to control when in fact it is he who controls them. This sort of maneuver is portrayed very well in his first scene with Mr. Vandergelder, in which he says â€Å"You’ll never regret it, Mr. Vandergelder. You’ll never regret it.† It is such a simple line, and yet there is so much there. Malachi makes it seem like he is just another man who is happy about getting a job, when in reality he is masking his true intentions behind these innocent words. The real reason Malachi is happy to have gotten the job, is because he now has the ability to fix the inequality which exists between Vandergelder and the others. Truth be told, Malachi is actually the only individual who see this flaw amongst the characters, and he knows it should not be there. Therefore, by formulating this sort of innocent personality, Malachi Stacks gives himself the perfect opportunity to finally bring equality into the lives of the characters. It all happens in Act III when Mr. Vandelgelder is having his coat taken off as his purse filled with money falls to the ground. Malachi, knowing that the primary reason for such inequality amongst the characters is their financial situations, takes his chance to balance the scale. However, he does not make a big deal out of it. Malachi simply takes the purse, asks Vandelgelder if it’s his, and since the response is no he gives it to Cornelius. It’s very quick, subtle, and seems like the right thing to do. Yet, even though what he did was so simple, it was enough to bring equality into their lives and he knew that. By asking Vandergelder whether or not the purse was his, Malachi tested him to check if he deserves the money. For in his short little monologue that he has right after picking up the purse, Mr. Stacks says â€Å"The law is there to protect property, but- sure the law doesn’t care whether a property owner deserves his property or not, and the law has to be corrected†. Therefore when he asked Vandelgelder â€Å"Did you drop something† the real question was â€Å"Are you worthy of all this money that you have†. Vandelgelder responding quickly said no, and that was enough for Malachi to know that the money deserved to be in the hands of someone else, Cornelius. It is also at this point that inequality begins to slowly disappear between the characters. First, Cornelius and Barnaby are able to pay for their expensive dinner and truly impress Mrs. Malloy along with Minnie. Then Mrs. Levi finally tells Mr. Vandergelder what she thinks of him when he cannot pay the bill, and that is when he finally realizes what kind of man he is. Slowly through scenes like these, the balance between the characters begins to even out and by the end, everyone is happy, joyful, and most of all the inequality amongst them completely vanishes all thanks to Malachi Stacks. Though Thornton chose Malachi to be the tool for equilibrium amongst the characters by having him â€Å"redistribute the superfluities†, the part also is important when it comes to the moral of the story. Of course, after reading The Matchmaker it safe to say that there are multiple lessons to be learned from this play, but one of the main ones shows up in Malachi’s monologue. Right after discussing the entire matter of redistributing property, Thornton has the character talk about how one man should not have more than one vice. In fact, he ends his line with the words â€Å"One vice at a time†. Now this entire concept might seem abstract, because after all even in today’s world vices are looked down upon. However, Thornton shows what two vices can do to a man by having Malachi use Vandergelder’s wrongs against him. His first true frailty is that in his own world Mr. Vandergelder sees himself a king, where no one can stop him because he has so much money. The second is his passion for money. In fact, his first vice comes from this one, because to him a person who has more money has more authority. So instead of merely having Vandergelder destroy himself through his vices, Thornton uses Malachi to show how having more than one vice is recipe for destruction. First, he uses Vandergelder’s attitude towards himself to gain his trust, by pretending to be loyal to him. Next, once Vandergelder thinks he has him under his control, Malachi uses the second frailty against him taking that which is most precious, his money, and giving it away. By using both of these flaws in his master’s character, Mr. Stacks brings Vandergelder into a state of despair where he has lost everything that made him, a King in his own mind. One man. Three Scenes. Yet without him, The Matchmaker would never be the same. Thornton Wilder made a smart decision in imgaging such a character, because he is developed in such a way that his importance to the whole play is not realized until the conclusion. For with just a simple action of handing off a purse to Cornelius, Malachi made a ripple effect which changed the course of the entire production and made all the difference. Malachi Stacks made all the difference.

On The Morning of Christ’s Nativity: An Application of The Bible to the Work of John Milton

Milton's Nativity Ode contains a â€Å"theory of all things† in respect to his vision. This theory deals greatly with the idea that the human body is merely a tomb for the soul. While in the Bible we have been taking the body of the King to represent the whole land. The death of the King is in comparison the death of the land. Like the Kings of Christ's time, Milton writes to bring attention to the three types of liberty he hoped to achieve in England: Liberty from the Church [tyranny of the bishops], liberty of the individual [divorce and education], and liberty from the state [King]. The poem can be broken down into four parts: the first eight verses deal with the coming of Christ, the next ten with the mystery of music, verse nineteen and forward focus on the silencing of the oracles and concludes with verse twenty-seven and the birth of Christ. In â€Å"On the Morning of Christ's Nativity† Milton sees both Christmas and Easter as the same thing since it is impossible to have one without the other. The baby in the cradle is the man on the cross. John Milton's â€Å"On The Morning of Christ's Nativity† uses the idea of the Jesus of history and the Christ of fact to relay his ideas of the creation of the world and the synonymous events. Comparison can be drawn between John Gospel and â€Å"On the Morning of Christ's Nativity† for it is an intensely symbolic book. John's version of Christ is a Christ of Faith, which has a plays a large part in the Ode. In the fifth verse of the â€Å"Nativity Ode† Milton declares that the saviour would come and sacrifice himself for mankind and work with his father to create â€Å"perpetual peace† (7]. In the glorification of Jesus in John's Gospel, the spirit makes him known as the Son of God. In the first hymn of the poem Christ is compared to nature and the natural world. For Milton, harmony can only be found in nature; nature has a deeper meaning then is initially revealed to the reader. Snow is able to cover the earth and blanket all of its sins. Nature takes the form of trees and rivers in the Old Testament; the Trees of Knowledge and Life as well as the Rivers of Eden [Pison, Gihon, Hiddekel, and Euphrates]. As in comparison, in relation to the serpent, Milton uses the dragon to signify everything that is evil in the world. In classical mythology the dragon signifies the same as the serpent that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden: The old dragon underground In straiter limits bound, Not half so far casts his usurped sway, And wroth to see his kingdom fail. [168-171] The Classics give you a limited and partial image of the truth. Milton uses classical mythology to prove that even in a pagan religion snakes are equated with evil doings. The slaying of the dragon is connected to every dragon slaying known to Milton from both the Biblical and Classical worlds. Milton recounts the story of how as an infant Hercules strangled two snakes: Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine: Our babe to show his Godhead true, Can in his swaddling bands control the damned crew. [226-228]. Classical mythology, or the belief in it cannot save your soul but it can give you a nudge in the right direction. While in the poem Christ is replacing the classical culture he is also part of classical antiquity. At the closing of the poem we return to the musical serenade of the angels and the angel harmony as the angels sin in order serviceably. St. Paul like Milton believed that the body was merely a tomb for the soul: a container that while it was fallen could through acts of salvation help the soul return to a state of grace after death. Death as we see it is not really death then by the standards of Milton; death only wounds the physical body and allows the soul/spirit to return to the heavens. With death comes liberty, from the church, self and state. To St. Paul the body of mankind was an ever perishing home to an eternal soul. This is a recurrent theme in the narrative of the Bible, a story of loss and recuperation. Milton's â€Å"On the Morning of Christ's Nativity† calls on many images and ideas that are expressed in the Old and New Testament's of the King James Bible from the idea that the King is the land, the body is a vessel for the soul and that the snake/serpent and dragon are all representative of evil whether examining Biblical or Classical literature. Milton uses Biblical allusion and references to give his argument weight with his reader who would have surely at that time been familiar enough with the middles to draw the comparisons quickly and effectively. Top of Form Bottom of Form

Meetings on Policy Issues Essay - 1082 Words

Meetings on Policy Issues The first meeting I attended was the State Early Childhood Advisory Council (SECAC) meeting. It was held in the Sillers building in Jackson, Mississippi. The meeting was held on February 9, 2012. The people in attendance were members of the council, who were made up of various leaders in the field of early childhood such as members of the Department of Human Services (DHS), EXCEL by 5, the Center for Education Innovation, and the Mississippi State Department of Health (MSDH). Beyond the council members there were about 14 others, including myself, who also work in the field of early childhood education such as child care owners or directors and those who work with programs aimed at providing assistance to†¦show more content†¦It was very formal and the members of the council took turns and followed the agenda very closely. The Executive Director, Annjo Lemons, gave explanation of the items being discussed to the public attendees. The council provided a list of current bills related to young children to all those in attendance and explained each one. One of the main focuses of the SECAC meeting was coordinating services in order to improve service to families with young children. The council suggested drafts of 3 different models that would define roles â€Å"top-to-bottom†. One key piece of this coordination of services would include moving child care licensing and regulation from the MSDH to DHS. The council wants the proposal drafts by March 1st. The idea of moving licensing and regulation of child care centers to DHS is an effort to streamline services and information for child care providers and families. Policy Framework Interest group theory framework is comprised of a â€Å"group†¦.through which individuals exert influence on government† (Zimmerman, 2001, p. 255). 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