Indigenous Child Welfare and Child Protection Social Work Education in Canada

Background and Purpose:
There are calls to action from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Commission (MMIWGC) that directly address social work, education and Indigenous children in child welfare. There have been a number of scholars who have contributed to the development of an Indigenous approach to social work more broadly and how to teach it. However, there has been little research into the way that Indigenous content has been included in child welfare education and the barriers and facilitators to its inclusion. This study aimed to draw from the experience of child welfare educators across Canada to understand their experiences including Indigenous content in their child welfare/protection social work curricula.

Methods:
Researchers reviewed institutions in Canada that teach child welfare/protection curricula to identify potential participants, with focus on university Bachelor’s, Master’s or PhD level social work programs. From these programs, researchers collected publicly available course outlines and reviewed public staff directories to identify instructors who teach/recently taught child welfare/protection courses. When the contact information was unavailable, researchers contacted administrators of the institutions to request contact information when it was unavailable online.

Eighteen participants responded to an anonymous online survey. Four of the participants identified as Indigenous. All participants indicated they had at least three years of teaching experience. Similarly, most participants had at least three years of experience teaching child welfare/protection courses in social work education. Most participants only had experience teaching in a single province and some had experience across multiple provinces. The provinces represented by respondents were British Columbia, Ontario, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador and Saskatchewan. Text responses in the survey were collectively coded and analyzed with inductive thematic analysis.

Results:
Participants were asked to indicate, from a list of child welfare related topics, in which areas they included Indigenous content. It was most commonly included in the subject areas of historical and contemporary context of child welfare, legislation and policies to guide practice, and kinship care. It was least commonly included in the subject areas of youth engagement, and writing case notes. Participants were also invited to suggest other areas in which they included Indigenous content. New subject areas included the teaching of Indigenous knowledge/perspectives, allyship, children’s rights, and practices like reflexivity and family group conferencing.

Conclusions and Implications:
Respondents were asked to share advice they had for instructors integrating Indigenous content into their curricula. They suggested inviting a variety of Indigenous people and perspectives into their classrooms. Respondents encouraged other instructors to teach the history of Indigenous peoples and invite students to recognize how colonization impacts the lives of the families they work with. The authors are Indigenous and have experiences in social child welfare social work education. Further research should explore the viewpoint of social work students, as the manner in which Indigenous content is received and understood would best be measured through learners’ perspectives.

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