Abstract
This study investigates the perceptions of early-career social workers on their academic preparation for their social work employment in the context of the challenging road and ambitious comeback of social work in post-communist Romania. Results showed respondents felt ill-prepared in their transition from education to their employment and received limited resources from employers to support the application of knowledge and skills learnt at university to the realities of daily professional practice. A multi-pronged approach is needed to educate new social workers at both university and employer levels with the goal of providing quality social services to clients and their families.
Keywords
Introduction and background
Social work profession and academic education: An overview of the Romanian context
Romania’s 42-year history of communism, from 1947 to 1989, significantly disrupted the field of professional social work and social work academic education, banned in 1969 (Buzducea, 2009). The reinstating and rebuilding of social work began after the communist regime fell, and in 1990, the 4-year undergraduate bachelor’s in social work degree was restored. Continuous progress was made in offering both undergraduate studies and various master’s degree programmes. Currently, the 3-year social work education is organized in accordance with the Bologna Process (Romanian Parliament, 2004) aimed at harmonizing higher education systems for academic exchanges and degree recognition across European countries. In 2019, there were 22 social work programmes registered, with additional programmes organized by theology faculties (Lazăr, 2021). In addition, the first PhD in social work commenced Fall semester 2022 at the University of Bucharest and in 2023 at West University of Timisoara.
The Romanian Agency for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ARACIS), established in 2005, is responsible for the external quality evaluation of higher education. The analysis of the curricula of all social work programmes (Lazăr, 2021) indicated that the total number of hours allocated to practice placements throughout the undergraduate studies varies between 400 and 700 (e.g. 4 hours/week or 6 hours/week or summer placement, while others included reflective/mentoring labs on practice experienced by students).
Given the important initial focus and great strides realized in re-establishing social work academic education and the professionalization of social work in Romania, empirical attention has shifted in recent years to a range of workforce topics, including examination of potential gaps in knowledge and skills transfer from formal social work academic education to those who choose professional social work practice employment. Understanding the perceptions of newly qualified social workers is important to improve education and ultimately professional practice.
Academic preparedness for professional social work practice
Social work education is continuously evolving in its aspiration to devise methods to best prepare students for professional practice. Yet defining and measuring social work students’ readiness for practice is a complex phenomenon, in part because of the many and varied interests of each of the stakeholders-clients, trainees (students), the academy, employers, government and community (Healy and Meagher, 2007). Most relevant to our study presented in this article is the research on post-qualified (i.e. graduated) early-career social workers which analyses the perceptions of those newly employed who reflect on their academic preparation for their employment.
Moriarty et al. (2011) offer a thorough discussion of the complexities (e.g. definitions, study designs and methodologies) within this body of literature prior to 2011 in their scoping review of newly qualified professionals across social work and several other helping professions in the United Kingdom. The authors note the tension in the literature (which remains today) between university and employer contributions to preparing new professionals, with some attempts to bridge this gap. Other research corresponds such that, regardless of instituting formal specialized programmes, both educational improvements in academia and employment policies and procedures are needed. The degree’s limitations in educational outcomes are linked to a perceived lack of ‘reality’ in both classroom instruction and field placement (Tham and Lynch, 2020). Respondents commonly expressed a sense of being unprepared for the realities of professional life, emphasizing disparities between their field placements and subsequent qualified professional roles (Jansen, 2018). Some even noted that their field placements were insufficient for adequately preparing them for their future careers (Langarita et al., 2024; Tham and Lynch, 2019). Moreover, early-career social workers mentioned difficulties related to how to deal with administrative/bureaucratic procedures (Segev et al., 2022) or how to manage conversations or difficult situations with hostile clients (Tham and Lynch, 2019). Voll et al. (2022) stressed that social workers need to learn more about how to apply theoretical knowledge during their education (e.g. more realistic cases included in teaching process or the involvement of practice field experienced professionals). In terms of workplace, early-career social workers experienced a lack of formal induction (Tham and Lynch, 2019) and of supervision (Segev et al., 2022) and felt less supported regarding continuous professional development (CPD) (Grant et al., 2017). Other issues at their workplace were related to the unexpected volume of administrative tasks and little opportunity for innovation (Langarita et al., 2024) and anxiety about doing something wrong according to the workplace regulations and rules (Tham and Lynch, 2019).
Research on this topic in Romania is in its infancy. One research project, called SocioPlus, aimed to enhance the content of undergraduate social work curriculum at the universities in Oradea and Arad. The findings, based on a survey with 73 recent graduates, of which only 47 percent were employed in the social work field, indicated that graduates valued their academic knowledge but felt that improvements were needed (Hatos, 2015). These included increased field practice, especially in public social work agencies, improved monitoring and evaluation of placements, greater support and reliability from field instructors and enhanced collaboration between placement providers and universities. Regarding classroom learning, graduates expressed a desire for more practical, interactive and up-to-date courses, with a stronger focus on legislation and communication skills. They also recommended a blend of formal university-based learning with informal outside university-regulated activities and stressed the importance of spending more time in the placement rather than in theoretical/classroom courses.
Given the dearth of research available about Romanian social work education, our exploratory study aims to understand how early-career social workers perceive their social work education degree in preparing them for their current social work workplace, with a focus on their first 3 years of employment.
Methods
Study design
The data we present here come from a larger workforce project examining Romanian social workers’ perceptions of their working conditions through a mixed-methods design (quantitative survey n = 1044; qualitative interviews n = 110). In this article, we present the findings from 22 qualitative interviews with early-career social workers who are employed in various social work fields of practice in Romania (Table 1). The semi-structured interview guide covered a variety of topics such as education and professional development, responsibilities held at workplace, working with clients, relationships with co-workers and sources of satisfaction and stress. The study received ethics approval both from the Ethics Commission at the faculty level and from the Executive Committee of CNASR-National College of Social Workers in Romania (the professional body established in 2005).
Characteristics of the early-career social workers interviewed.
Recruitment and data collection
We recruited social workers from various professional and sociodemographic backgrounds using the personal network of team members and key informants. We focused on early-career social workers according to the competency framework developed by CNASR for qualified social workers (bachelor’s degree) registered in the National Register for Social Workers. In addition to acquiring the BSW, there are four levels of professional competence depending on seniority, including the compulsory achievement of a certain number of professional credits through CPD: (1) Entry level/Beginner: less than 12 months of professional seniority, (2) Practitioner: 1–3 years, (3) Specialist: 3–5 years and (4) Principal social worker: over 5 years. Our operational definition for early-career social workers comprised the first two levels.
Five members of our research team conducted face-to-face interviews; two members of the team then analysed the transcripts consulting the interviews as needed. The interviews lasted on average 1 hour. All interviews were digitally recorded with the informed consent of participants and then transcribed verbatim. In this article, we assigned codes to replace respondent names, and we did not disclose the respondents’ county of employment or their university.
Data analysis
A thematic analysis of the data was conducted (Boyatzis, 1998) using the qualitative data analysis and research software Atlas.ti. Two members of the research team independently read the transcribed interviews line-by-line to identify and code for common themes. This initial open coding was refined through axial coding by reducing codes into higher order analytic concepts (Strauss, 1987). In addition to consulting with all members of the research team, the two researchers met regularly to discuss and refine the coding frame enhancing rigour regarding the coding strategy and providing the occasion for reflexivity checks and search for negative cases (Saldana, 2014). We focused on data related to how respondents considered that their university education prepared them for their current workplace roles and professional practice.
Findings
Our core finding about perceived readiness for practice by early-career social workers is rooted in respondents feeling ill-equipped to apply learnt academic theory in their professional work with real clients. The professed lack in aptitude in how to apply theoretical knowledge and practice skills to the complexities of their clients’ daily lives is magnified by the struggle that social workers were essentially left to make these theory-to-practice connections on their own without the benefit of adequate entry-level employer training and supervision. Consequently, although social workers reflected upon strengths in their classroom, curricula and field placement social work academic education, what was remarkable were their reports that academia over-emphasized broad theories at the expense of the necessary practice theories and skills instruction that could be applied to actual client cases during school and subsequently in their workplace environment.
Workplace: ‘ Thrown into a pit’
Overall, respondents reported a mismatch between theory they were taught at university, as part of the social work degree programme, and their current professional work life as qualified social workers. For example,
I mean theory, practice is this . . . [In university] I read, and I don’t know how many books and articles, but put me into practice. And with the intervention plan . . . that in theory is so nice but when you start doing it . . . (FL13, NGO-Healthcare, 30 months’ practice)
With few exceptions, respondents found themselves in agencies with limited resources, such that they were the only social worker in the office, had non-social work colleagues and managed large caseloads with little to no support. IG4 portrays the isolation expressed by many of being on their own to figure out how theory relates to practice:
The faculty prepared me, I liked it very much, but it didn’t prepare me enough for the job I have now. I mean I was, I felt, thrown into a pit, a hole, [just] like that. (IG4, Public Services-Child protection, 12 months’ practice)
Respondents acknowledged the importance of on-the-job training to facilitate the transition from university to workforce because, ‘Sometimes I don’t know where to start. I mean I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, how to actually intervene’ (FL13), yet few received proper orientation, onboarding and social work practice supervision. IG11 reflects: ‘The training in university is the only training I had for this job. [I was given] a one-hour meeting where we were very briefly introduced just as titles, all the responsibilities and all the paperwork drawn up’ (IG11, Public Services/subcontracted from an NGO, Child protection, 24 months’ practice). IG13 also depicts the experience of most regarding the perceived unrealistic expectations of employers, requiring new entrants to adjust to workplace requirements shortly upon hiring with little to no orientation:
A considerable part of the social work agencies or organizations are expecting from the recent social work graduate . . . to know from the beginning, so to speak, or in a period of a few days: two, three, four days . . . without taking into account that that person coming out of the university needs to be somewhat guided by an experienced person [. . .] (IG13, NGO-Mental health/Adults, 3 months’ practice)
Employer expectations to jump right in and handle high-risk, complex cases are also notable in respondents’ statements. IG11 received no orientation yet was expected to make a difficult ethical decision about foster care of an abandoned child in a maternity unit on her second day on the job:
I remember that from the second day of work I was in the maternity hospital to take out a child, just me and the foster carer. Not even knowing what to say, given that it was my first job as [a] social worker. (IG11)
None of the respondents received social work supervision yet they mentioned supervision as something useful and desired ‘especially for those who have just entered the labour market’ (AC8, Public Services-Adults, 6 months’ practice) and because ‘unfortunately it is very difficult to apply what you learnt in theory’ (IG14, Public Services-Adults, 8 months’ practice). D16 discussed the necessity of supervision for new entrants, needing help integrating university knowledge and the application of theory to practice:
When I entered the workforce as a social worker, I heard from the colleagues I worked with that university didn’t help. And I made a point of contradicting them, that it does help us, it’s just that in the impact phase when you actually go into an office and work . . . you don’t know, or at least that’s what happened to me, how to implement the concepts or, well, what I had internalized at the university level. The truth is that they only teach us theoretically, they don’t prepare us on the practical side, very little. (D16, NGO-Elderly, 36 months’ practice)
The respondents’ narratives also express a belief that they should know how to do their new job without proper supervision, perhaps holding unrealistic expectations for themselves. IG11 recounts how she would ask for help from a peer, when necessary, but she emphasized her wish for some type of peer supervision, to meet periodically with her co-workers to discuss common issues. In its absence, and because of perceived employer expectations that she should already be self-sufficient as a new social worker, she chose to prepare by herself, thus assuming potential risk for decision-making in complex cases:
I have often felt the need for . . . not training but guidance, at least; or to meet at some point in a room, all employees and discuss: look at my problem, look at my case, look at what I face, what we do and what can be done and it didn’t happen. That is, we are somewhat like that, on our own, risky for some of our colleagues [because] there are also extreme situations. . . . Most of the time I tried to study very, very well before and legislatively and practically and theoretically and I made the decision on my own, that is what I did and I took a risk and I did that thing. (IG11)
The apparent absence of a proper transition from university to workforce compounded the usual uncertainty and lack of confidence of new entrants:
When I came here [as a new employee], there was no social worker to guide me or tell me exactly what to do and I had to sort of teach myself. . . . The beginning was very hard and after two days I said I couldn’t do it anymore [in that moment, but I didn’t quit]. I was ashamed to talk to people, even though I’m open . . . it was like I didn’t have the courage. (IG25, Public Services-Adults, 20 months’ practice)
Similarly, although also describing the usual learning curve of new entrants, another respondent recounts her embarrassment, believing she should have had prior knowledge about concrete tasks that ought to have been taught in university:
I came here and the first time I was given a report [to write] I was looking at it and I didn’t know what to do with it. I was embarrassed to say I didn’t know what to do . . . I remember it took me a whole day to write a report. I spent eight hours writing a report, which I now do in 3–4 minutes. [. . .] The difference is huge compared to when I first arrived and how I am now. (IG19, Public Services/subcontracted from NGO, Child-protection, 12 months’ practice)
In contrast to the image of being thrown into a pit, IG17 noted the importance of her colleagues’ support from keeping her falling off the metaphorical cliff (moon): ‘Collegially, I feel like I have someone by my side, I don’t feel [like I have] fallen off the moon . . . so I feel at ease, and I feel like I can be productive, too’ (IG17, Public Services-Child protection, 24 months’ practice).
In terms of professional settings, NGO social workers face financial constraints and job insecurity due to dependence on external funding, contrasting with the stability of public service jobs. In terms of tasks, even those without NGO experience perceived these settings as more flexible. A hospital social worker (FL13) noted that medical staff misunderstood her role, leading to uncertainty about task assignments. IG7, a child protection social worker, perceived it easier to be responsible for the childminder than directly for the child. Regarding client expectations, many social workers mentioned a focus on financial benefits rather than social services.
In the next section, we present our respondents’ concerns regarding the effectiveness of academic programmes in responding to workplace requirements.
Social work education: Theory–practice gap
When early-career social workers were questioned about how their university education prepared them for current workplace roles, they expressed overall satisfaction initially, speaking highly about their experience as students and of their professors. Social work education helped to foster their personal growth and development of their professional identity, inspiring them to ‘change the world’ (IG25); ‘it is precisely thanks to the courses that I took at the university . . . that I have developed a lot’ (D13, Public Services-Child protection, 12 months). IG17 echoed the sentiment of others that school was ‘a piece of cake’. Yet this assurance quickly diminished once the respondents entered social work employment; the majority reported a realization, if not shock, that they were ill-prepared for managing the daily tasks required of professional social workers. Consequently, upon reflection, respondents largely identified a mismatch between what they were taught in their social work university education and the realities of daily professional practice as illustrated by this comment:
What they say in the classroom is totally different from the field . . . . The reality in the field is totally different. (AC8)
Regarding classroom learning, most participants felt there was an overreliance on broad theories in the curricula; they generally considered theory important but felt more practical application of the theoretical knowledge during classroom instruction would have better prepared them for their job. For example, IG17 recalled the usefulness of what she viewed as applied theories of psychology and social psychology theories, yet D4 elucidates the overarching sentiment of needing more applied theory in the classroom:
In the faculty [i.e. social work university program], it helped me a lot theoretically . . . but there were a lot of problems that I encountered in practice, problems that . . . were not discussed in theory. (D4, NGO-Child protection, 24 months’ practice)
Respondents voiced an appreciation of classroom pedagogical methods they thought should have occurred more frequently, such as role-play, that emphasized theory-informed practice skills as ‘it was a preview of what was to come’ (IG6, NGO-Mental health/Children, 12 months’ practice). D15 described the ideal, but rare, occurrence in these data not mentioned by other respondents such that she had the opportunity to examine and discuss the application of theory-to-practice in the classroom which she believed later facilitated her ability to ponder learnt theory at her workplace where she conducts home visits:
A lot of times I remember the theories, come back from the field [home visit] and make the connection. I think we’ve discussed it at different courses, seminars, and it’s interesting how you can see how it applies and doesn’t. (D15, NGO-Elderly, 15 months’ practice)
In addition to teaching methods, respondents were largely enthusiastic about practice/applied theories, believing that their practice skills were enhanced by courses that taught practice-relevant subject matter such as human behaviour, communication and counselling skills, reflecting the common belief that more practical content is needed. Demonstrating the sentiment of many regarding a perceived mismatch between university curricula and the workplace, IG17 voiced frustration that she was not prepared for the specific tasks of her job in a child family separation prevention unit:
I would have expected from the university to tell us exactly how to work in an office, in a DGASPC [Public Services], to give you a first impression of the place. [. . .] You have to know what to expect, the standards here are much higher than what you do in university. (IG17)
However, several respondents felt they needed specialized legislation (i.e. law and policy) content to cover the diversity of cases that they confronted in their jobs (e.g. child protection laws and disability benefits requirements) because their activity in a public agency, including the intervention process, is based on legal requirements (e.g. the procedure and time limits for establishing special protection for children deprived of parental care). Moreover, the mandatory exam for their employment application is mainly based on legal knowledge and less on social work theory.
In contrast, the comments of IG11 offer a different perspective that illuminates differing expectations of the role of social work education in preparing students for the workplace. For example, IG11 described feeling as prepared as was possible by the degree programme but also needing to learn more information on the job:
Pretty much everything I know how to do I say at least 50% is from faculty, the other 50% is after: the field itself because of course in university I did a little bit of each, the rest at the specific job. (IG11) In one instance, a respondent was allowed to build her coursework around her substantive field of practice and client population interests to obtain specialized subject matter and field placement making a ‘study module’ within her social work degree. (FL13)
As for field placement education, respondents largely noted its positive role in their development; they described field placement as the first taste of what social workers do in their professional practice, viewing this as an opportunity for theory application, the discovery of possible fields of practice and client populations:
Placements helped me in the end, eventually [post-graduation]. Theory is theory, but until you get to an institution to actually see how a social worker works and what she/he actually does, you have no way of knowing. (IG24, Public Services-Adults, 5 months’ practice)
Nevertheless, like criticisms about classroom learning, many felt that their field experience did not necessarily resemble the realities of social work practice even though most comments reflected respondents’ expectations that it was the responsibility of the professor, not the field instructor, to help them apply theory to practice. Respondents’ critiques of field placement are reflected in both quantity and quality concerns regarding the need for more required field hours, students’ responsibility to attend their placement and more serious attention given to the teaching of applicable social work tasks within variations in type of agency settings across, for example, public agencies and NGOs:
The way of teaching in social work . . . a lot of theory and long and boring stuff . . . it doesn’t really train you for social work. I think somehow there should be a change: more in practice, more seriousness in practice, more supervision in [field] practice . . . (IG12, NGO-Mental health/Adults, 24 months’ practice)
AM18 (NGO-Child Protection, 24 months’ practice) believed her field placement was ‘very useful’ but insufficient, so she supplemented her field placement and coursework with voluntary service to fill a perceived gap in university social work practice instruction. A few respondents offered a different perspective; they were exceptionally pleased with their field placement education in preparing them for their job because they had specialized learning conditions (e.g. the PractiPass Project which provided additional specialized curriculum content related to their field placement, mandatory field placement hours and other mandatory requirements for both student and field instructor). An additional factor that enhanced one’s preparation for employment reported by three social workers is that they were hired by their field placement. IG7 concluded: ‘I can say that my luck is that I did my internship in this very service [unit]. . . I think that’s how all students should do field placement’. Compared with her regular, generic first field placement, her second placement with the PractiPass seemed to be a best practice on how theory was explained in practice by field instructors:
We were prepared differently [in PractiPass]. It is not like you go to placement and you just look over the file [like I did in the regular placement]. No, it is much more important to do exactly what social workers as practitioners do. Instead, here I worked on cases and the legislation was explained to me; meaning it was very good. (IG7)
Discussion
Our core finding, consistent with existing literature internationally, is that early-career social workers’ apprehension is rooted in the well-documented theory-to-practice gap which cuts across applied practice professions and has been the subject of considerable debate over the years (Al-Ma’seb et al., 2015; Jansen, 2018; Langarita et al., 2024; Segev et al., 2022; Tham and Lynch, 2020). As part of the usual developmental process, early-career social workers are likely to experience tensions due to the initial expectations and the sometimes harsh reality of professional practice (Donnellan and Gordon, 2010). The entrance into the professional workforce can be characterized as a ‘rite of passage’ or a ‘baptism of fire’ (Bates et al., 2010) with employers’ high expectations of new social work hires to be able to apply theory to practice (Howard et al., 2015). Our findings parallel Jansen (2018), who argues for improved workplace learning environments for recent graduates: the ‘importance of allowing the newcomers to be newcomers’ (p. 1539).
Most striking among our respondents was that they were eager and trying to integrate academic knowledge in their professional employment practice, but most had to do this on their own. Our respondents conveyed that agencies did not assist with this transfer of knowledge from theory to practice because they assumed students should already know it (Howard et al., 2015) or because workplace staff were not adept at using theory or because they dismissed the importance of academic theories. The stress of the normative developmental learning curve was amplified by the reality that it is most common to be ‘thrown into a pit’ without proper orientation, onboarding and supervision, often with few or no qualified social work managers or colleagues, and potentially unrealistic expectations.
Our findings comport with others such as child welfare social work employees who reported irregular and inadequate workplace supervision especially given high, complex caseloads, concluding that more practical training in academic classrooms is needed and also because field instructors are not necessarily strong teachers (Baginsky and Manthorpe, 2016). While some respondents worked even harder to meet the challenge, others began to believe employers’ unrealistic assumptions and felt that there was something wrong with them, making them vulnerable to taking unnecessary decision-making risks and potential worker retention problems (McCarthy et al., 2022; Petersén, 2023). A few early-career social workers in our sample also relied on the necessary, but not sufficient, informal peer support available at their workplace (Grant et al., 2014) due to the lack of formal induction and supervision (Jansen, 2018; Segev et al., 2022; Tham and Lynch, 2019). Although the law on the statute of social workers requires beginner social workers (<12 months of experience) to be supervised, its application is rarely followed and implemented by Romanian employers.
Our respondents emphasized the need for detailed knowledge and skills, which they did not receive during employment orientation, and thus perceived the classroom ought to provide this (see below). Yet, the role of the generalist social work degree is not to prepare graduates to work in a specific field of practice at a professional level (Beddoe et al., 2018), but to secure the academic learning foundation for social work professional practice (Preston-Shoot, 2004). It is expected that CPD will take place during the years post-qualification given the diversity of work settings, roles and tasks and clients (Croisdale-Appleby, 2014; Gordon and Donnellan, 2010; Lazăr et al., 2016). CNASR (2019) launched a ‘Code regarding the practice of the social worker’ in an attempt to support the competence development of social workers according to their seniority. Unfortunately, barriers remain in social workers’ access to CPD (Rentea et al., 2021).
Despite the widespread general satisfaction with their social work degree by respondents in this study in accordance with other Romanian research (Saveanu and Buhas, 2015), they hold more negative perceptions about the utility of theoretical learning at their current workplace or they need more support to connect theory to practice (Balauta and Vlaicu, 2017). The study findings are consistent with ongoing debates about the well-documented theory–practice gap and the challenge of incorporating knowledge and skills in the classroom course content rather than relying solely on field placement to provide them (Morris et al., 2023). Our respondents emphasized the need for detailed knowledge and skills which they did not receive during employment orientation and thus perceived the professor in the classroom ought to provide this. They expected from their professors, and less so from the field instructor, to receive a how-to guide applicable at their workplace. Social work education should provide them students with opportunities to connect theoretical foundations with practical application, emphasizing the importance of making intentional method choices in real-world practice settings (Hannan and Teater, 2024). There is higher appreciation for courses that had direct application to practice (McSweeney and Williams, 2019), and the integration of theory and practice is supported by pedagogical methods such as role-play and more case studies included in teaching process (Baginsky and Manthorpe, 2016; Roman et al., 2015; Voll et al., 2022). Despite the need for traditional in-class role-play, also newer innovative practice skills pedagogical methods such as simulated instruction (i.e. trained actors to assume various character roles) could be employed (Carter et al., 2018); this would complement the theory knowledge and practice skills taught in the classroom that students can practise further with real clients in their field placement.
Although curricular content adjustments could be made in communication skills (Reith-Hall and Montgomery, 2023), dealing with involuntary clients (McSweeney and Williams, 2019), conflict resolution (Tham and Lynch, 2019) and legislation (Voll et al., 2022), generalist social work practice education is not meant to be a job orientation. Billett (2013) notes that it is unrealistic to expect that the aim of education is to provide specific learning for application elsewhere due to the influence of societal, situational and personal factors.
Similarly, the responsibility and accountability afforded during field placement cannot fully prepare one for the workplace (McSweeney and Williams, 2019); yet our respondents also shed light on necessary refinements in field placement settings and field placement supervisors, issues recently being tackled in other Romanian publications (Balauta and Vlaicu, 2017; Roman et al., 2015; Saveanu et al., 2017). Despite the substantial number of placements provided each semester throughout the study, the students’ experience is different from site to site despite the same learning objectives. Our most satisfied respondents suggest that specialized programmes (e.g. the PractiPass Project) can serve as a best-practice model of field placement developed by universities in conjunction with public agencies and NGOs because they provide specialized curriculum content, mandatory field placement hours, clear requirements for students and field instructors and paid time for field instructors, which correlates to an improvement in the quality of placements, a finding supported also by Croisdale-Appleby (2014). Finally, more importance ought to be placed in terms of receiving a placement, such as students being required to attend, being supervised by a trained social worker and being given pertinent tasks. This may also explain why respondents believed more applied practice theory and skills ought to occur in the classroom as many perceived they were not receiving sufficient practical exposure in their placement.
Limitations
Our study is limited to Romanian social workers, yet, given the consistency of some key findings with existing literature, may have relevance internationally and especially to countries in the beginning stages of developing social work education and the profession. Generalization is limited due to the nature of qualitative inquiry, the small number of respondents and the uneven distribution of Romanian universities and degree-level represented. Future research could include large-scale quantitative and qualitative mixed-methods study across Romanian universities and comprise other stakeholders responsible for provision and recipients of social work education (e.g. professors, field instructors, employers and clients).
Conclusion
Romanian universities providing social work degrees have accomplished much in a relatively short time since the 1989 fall of communism, with current research pointing to ongoing improvements in preparation for the professional workforce. The results of our qualitative study illuminate that early-career social workers in this study generally felt ill-prepared in their transition from education to employment. Thus, employers need to provide better induction and on-the-job training to newly qualified/employed staff as they frequently provided insufficient assistance in applying theoretical knowledge and skills to the realities of daily professional practice while, unrealistically, still expecting new entrants to be fully prepared ‘right out of the gate’. This was especially challenging in sites where social work supervisors or colleagues were few to none, and there was limited support for CPD. Consequently, our findings also revealed a perceived mismatch between theory and skills taught at university and their current professional life, suggesting the need for refinement of social work course curricula and field placement education. The classroom learning must provide more content related to the realities of professional life while field placement should support the integration of theory with practice. There is still work to be done in terms of universities developing requirements and training for field instructors (in Romania, the field instructor is not required to be a qualified social worker), evaluation (including student feedback) and ongoing monitoring. Enhancing field instructors’ training by academia supports their intellectual refreshment with updated social work curriculum content and diverse activities bridging theories with practical application. While ultimate goals may differ, participation in such training fosters their CPD, providing access to relevant information in the field. The assessment of students by field instructors offers valuable feedback on preparedness for professional practice, requiring interpretation by academia within the organizational setting and client context. A multi-pronged approach is needed to educate new career social workers at both university and employer levels with the goal of providing excellent social work service delivery to clients and their families. Furthermore, professional bodies can play a crucial role in supporting the job orientation and supervision process by advocating for clear standards implementation for early-career social workers.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by a grant of the Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digitization, CNCS-UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P4-PCE-2021-1965, within PNCDI-III, and project number PN-II-RU-TE-2014-4-2322/361/2015, with support from the National College of Social Workers in Romania.
