8 Learning from lived experiences
In England, the involvement of service users and carers in social work education has been a requirement since 2002 (Department of Health, 2002). This was upheld by the regulator, Social Work England, stating that ‘social work courses must be governed, resourced and managed using effective and transparent processes in collaboration with employers and people with lived experience of social work’ (SWE 2020).
The Practice Educator Professional Standards also require that those involved in placements and practice education must:
‘Commit to the needs and interests of people with lived experience of social work when assessing the capability and skills of learners at all stages of the assessment process. As appropriate, those with lived experience should play an active part in assessing those being accepted onto and undertaking training in practice education.’
Not only is this emphasis seen in social work education, but there is also a growing commitment to the validity of those who are ‘experts by their own lived experience’ in social work practice. Co-production is at the core of empowering approaches, particularly in adult social care whereby they ‘work in partnership by sharing power between people who draw on care and support’ (SCIE, 2022).
Activity 8 Co-production in practice education
Listen to Audio 1, which has been created by members of the Service User and Carer Group at The Open University. In this clip they discuss what co-production in the assessment of social work students means for them. Then answer the questions that follow.
| What are the benefits of co-production in practice education? | |
| What are the barriers of co-production in practice education? | |
| How might you address these challenges as a practice educator? |
Discussion
Input into assessment by people with lived experience is far reaching and potentially very impactful. In their research around this topic, Pearl et al. (2018) highlighted not only the benefits of constructive service user feedback but specifically the importance of the practice educator role in decoding this and making links to the development of learners’ practice.
Co-production can also involve collaborative work with the learner, creating a space for shared learning and knowledge exchange. Traditionally for qualified social workers, supervision is used to plan work, ensure accountability, and reflect on the emotional impact of practice. It also provides an opportunity for organisations to understand how effectively their policies and procedures operate, through dialogue between colleagues and across hierarchies.
While learners share some of these supervision needs, they also have additional requirements. These include learning about the work they are involved in, developing a professional identity, and having a safe space to explore resilience as they process new and unfamiliar experiences. Supervision for learners is therefore primarily a learning environment (Gregory et al., 2025; Tsui, 2005). As a practice educator, it is your responsibility to ensure this space is supportive and safe, enabling the learner to explore different approaches and integrate academic learning with feedback from the experiences of people who use services.
Supervision can be an organisational and pedagogical tool to build resilience for social work learners. Secondary trauma from new and challenging experiences can be reflected on and additional supports identified. Learners can experience challenges to not only their emerging professional identity, but also their personal identity if a negative incident on placement compounds something difficult that has happened in another area of their life. Again, the practice educator should be open to identifying these aspects with the learner, understanding them through their new developing professional lens and enabling them to gain support (Ahmed, 2023, Tedam, 2013).
Optional resource
Listen to this Research in Practice resource in which Clenton Farquharson talks about ‘working together and learning together’.
OpenLearn - Supporting social work learners: practice educator refresher (England)
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