Evaluation of Fast-Track Social Work Training Using Simulated Practice

Background and Purpose:

‘Frontline’ is a fast-track training scheme in England for social workers in child welfare, which aims to attract graduates with strong academic backgrounds who may not previously have considered a career in social work. The Frontline training model emphasises direct practice skills, with a single over-arching theoretical framework – a systemic model – and teaching of two evidence-based interventions. Frontline participants have generous financial support and considerable resources are invested in selecting the best possible candidates. The Government department which sponsored the initiative funded an independent evaluation of the Frontline pilot. The paper will focus on demographics and practice quality.

Methods:

A comparison of demographics and educational background was undertaken via bivariate analysis of data from the Frontline participant database on the first two cohorts (n=228) and data on all social work students in England (n=4750) from the Higher Education Statistics Agency. The practice quality of Frontline graduates (n=49) was assessed via a quasi-experimental study which compared them with qualifying students on mainstream programmes (n=66), including universities with higher and lower entry tariffs. Simulated interviews were set up with actors playing the parts of clients – a mother with learning difficulties and a teenage boy. Audio recordings were made and independently rated by two experienced practice assessors, according to generic social work practice quality criteria taken from the work of Marian Bogo and colleagues in Canada and agreed by a Delphi group of experts as appropriate for the UK. Simulated practice participants were also asked to write a brief written reflection on each interview and these were also independently rated. Assessors did not know to which groups the simulated practice participants belonged. Participant scores (1-5 scale) and self-efficacy ratings (0-100) were compared across the three groups using the Kruskal-Wallis test.

Results:

Frontline participants have significantly better prior qualifications than students on mainstream programmes. They are also significantly younger, more likely to have parents who were graduates and are more likely to have attended private schools. The Frontline programme also has fewer minority ethnic students than mainstream programmes. When all simulated practice participants were compared, Frontline participants were rated 0.52 higher than students on high tariff mainstream programmes for the quality of their interviewing (X²(2)=39.56, p<0.001) and 0.28 higher for their written reflection (X²(2)=21.76, p<0.001). When matched with a sub-sample from the mainstream programmes who had the minimum academic requirements for Frontline, so would themselves have been eligible to apply, the difference in interviewing quality remained. However, the difference in quality of written reflection was not statistically significant. Despite enjoying high ratings for practice quality, the Frontline trainees’ rating of their own confidence in their abilities was 8% lower than their mainstream counterparts.

Conclusions and Implications:

The practice quality of these fast-track students, as assessed in simulated practice, was encouraging. However, they are a more socially privileged and less diverse group than mainstream students. More research is needed to disentangle the effects of selection and the distinctive training model and also to address the limitations of simulated practice.