Lockdown Life as a Student Social Worker

Final year BA Social Work student Louis Moore reflects on the challenges of virtual placements, and what the pandemic has meant for social work training. 

A student social worker’s final year placement is the big one. The skills and values required for the job have been studied and practiced over the past two years. Lectures, libraries and thousands of words in essays have carved the beginnings of a professional social worker. Most enter their professional lives in a suit and tie; I’m entering mine in my pyjamas.

I am a social work student currently completing my final year placement. So far, it has been a profound experience, not only because I’m fulfilling a professional role for the first time, but because I'm doing it in my bedroom. Current lockdown restrictions have meant that most social work students are working from home. It can be hard to imagine how a profession based on “social change… and the empowerment and liberation of people,” (International Federation of Social Workers, 2014) can be replicated in this environment. Nonetheless, students are continuing to undertake professional placements with real social work teams to complete their training.

The local authority team I have been placed in act as the first point of contact for adults requiring social services intervention. I tackle emotionally challenging topics with service users daily. My role involves safeguarding vulnerable adults through enquires into alleged abuse and neglect. I work in partnership with individuals, professionals, and organisations to formulate measures that preserve and promote people’s wellbeing. Additionally, I conduct needs assessments with adults who require care and support. These assessments form the basis of a collaborative effort to meet a person’s needs whilst empowering them to make autonomous choices.

My account of this experience will start in true social work fashion: with the positives. Social workers do this through ‘strength-based practice’ whereby a person’s strengths are identified and built on. A strength for my experience is the opportunity that placement offers to practice and develop my skills and knowledge, regardless of the limitations of home working. Additionally, I can now call my cat a work colleague. She acts as a soundboard for critically reflecting on my practice whilst ensuring complete confidentiality (mostly because she has no idea what I’m rambling on about).

My experience unfortunately falls short of many positives as the reality of social work practice during lockdown entails many unprecedented challenges.  Human interaction has been severely limited by home working. The complex process of developing through relationships, personally and professionally, has been replaced by online training and phone calls to voices I’m unable to put a face to. Students require frequent supervision to match the fast-paced nature of practice. I significantly feel the absence of a nearby colleague to swivel my office chair to, as help is often not readily available. A less predictable effect of home working has been my struggle to pick up the language necessary for my particular role. Being in an office would have given me the chance to absorb the language that flies between colleagues. Instead, I’m left to figure out how to “take a TC from an OT about a potential CHC funded POC.” Would you understand that sentence?

My lack of psychological association with the real world of social work has created a disconnection from the reality of practice. It can feel like I’m playing a very grown-up video game (one that nobody would ever actually play) through my work laptop and headset. The severity of the work at hand is hard to comprehend when I've never actually met a service user face-to-face. Neither have I physically seen any of the positive changes I’ve worked hard to support people to achieve.

I undertake this role whilst simultaneously battling my own feelings of entrapment and stress. Learning to disconnect myself at the end of a working day has been especially challenging when work is at home. My usual hobbies have taken a new importance as I insist on making time for skateboarding, cycling and running (notice how these all require being outside). I’ve found a new interest in mindfulness meditation. This has helped me to recognise when stress and emotions are becoming overwhelming, and how to combat these by returning to a calm and focused state. I also organise a weekly Zoom meeting with other students on my course who share similar experiences of home working. This has helped myself and others to feel less alone and gives us a chance to laugh about the misfortunes of being a student in 2021.      

Perhaps the most prominent challenge of home working is the struggle to find motivation within the confinements of lockdown. It can be hard to rise every morning, with the weight of a global pandemic on my shoulders, for a 9am start on the desk next to my bed. The regulatory board for the profession, Social Work England, along with the University of Birmingham, have made some concessions to ease the pressure. However, many students cannot help but feel like the complexity and disadvantage of our experience is not reflected by these changes. We battle on, expected to fulfil the academic requirements of the pre-Covid era, whilst simultaneously coping with the present pandemic constraints.

As the profession adapts to new ways of working, Social Work students may have been thrown into the deep end for their own benefit.  This could be the new ‘norm’ for our future careers. From another perspective, I’m worried that home working has not prepared me for the demands and intricacies of practice beyond graduation.

In the end, I can only speak highly of the incredible social work team I have been placed in. Regular photo updates on WhatsApp of each team member’s cat (cat ownership is a job requirement in this team) and their welcoming support have kept me going. Perhaps the answer to my experience lies here, that the caring and supportive nature of social worker colleagues may provide the encouragement and confidence for students to transition into professional life—whether in their pyjamas or not.

Louis Moore is a social work student from Birmingham. He has previously worked with adults with disabilities in residential care as well as volunteering abroad with asylum seekers. Cat enthusiast and skateboard fanatic, he often wonders how he will integrate the two into social work.

If you are a UoB student struggling with mental health issues, you can request an appointment with a Wellbeing Officer and call the UoB 24/7 mental health support line on 00448003685819 (free phone). You are also encouraged to contact your GP.