Capitalising on volunteer experiences

Sala Alessi, Palazzo Marino, in the heart of Milan: that was the venue for an open seminar that our Milanese partner Ciessevi had arranged as part of the 3rd partnership meeting of the INVEST project on November 12th. In this majestic location all eyes were first focused on the mayor of Milan who welcomed the many participants as well as the INVEST partners from Spain, Denmark, the UK and our country. An admirable way of underlining the importance of volunteering and supporting European cooperation !
Capitalising on volunteer experiences: that was to be our theme, we had decided, much in line with the INVEST project objectives (described here). The open seminar provided an ideal opportunity to disseminate the European experiences with competence development and portfolios for volunteers to local stakeholders.
A Grundtvig learning partnership makes EU cooperation accessible, focused and concrete, once you've drawn up a solid plan and got it approved. This type of European project facilitates face-2-face meetings, resulting in worthwhile talks and discussions enabling interaction that leads to new ideas and perspectives. During small scale workshops many issues can be discussed at a concrete and insightful level via focused and well prepared assignments, which is why everybody learns so much (see here what was learned at an event just like this).
Moreover, it also supports a European spirit of solidarity in these difficult times in the Eurozone.This time the two workshops were implemented by our Cibervoluntarios partner from Madrid and our own university. Finally, the visits to three volunteering organisations in the Milan area made the meeting an overall success among the 28 delegates.Here's a picture of nearly the whole group at the end of day 1.

On our way back to the airport we got confronted with one of the many protest marches taking place all over Europe that day; as it turned out, it was the biggest day of union-organised protests since the crisis in the euro first broke out three years ago, with trade unions from 23 European countries joining in this day of action.

 More photos of this 3rd European level meeting of the INVEST project on flickr via this link.



This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This blog post reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained herein.

Infographics

An interesting new development: graphics presenting complex information quickly and clearly, for example in journalism and on the web. These so-called infographics are graphic visual representations of information, data or knowledge and appear to become more and more popular to communicate complex concepts and illustrate information that would be unwieldy in text form.
Here's one I saw this week about studying in Holland:

Source: studyinholland.nl via Anja on Pinterest

And here's another one I saw  appearing a while ago on opensite.org: about Wikipedia, may there be lots more to come !

Signing an MoU

It was Thursday October 18th when rector Glenn Thode of the University of Aruba and managing director Jeroen Oversier of our School of Social Work at Rotterdam University signed a Memorandum of Understanding in the presence of Juliet Chieuw, quality assurance officer, Peter Canrinus, educational manager, and Anja Stofberg, international coordinator.

The MoU establishes a common framework of cooperation, consultation and exchange of information to promote and facilitate exchanges. At the same time, it also underlines the importance of increasing international activity within our school of social work as well as within the department of Social Work and Development of the FAS (the Faculty of Arts and Science at UA).

The signature is a follow up of the talks and visits that took place over the last 12 months. Both in the Netherlands as well as in Aruba, talks always took place in a very positive atmosphere (see earlier blog posts here and here) and the closing statements usually expressed that future collaboration steps looked promising as both parties can benefit a lot from each other's expertise, approach and network.Interestingly, it was pointed out that small though the island of Aruba is, it can play a huge role as international hub in its surrounding area, a fascinating current development that is taking place in our increasingly globalising world that we are preparing our students for. So, now it's time to start planning in more detail !

 

Let's be inspired by a South African methodology !

This week the school of social work at Rotterdam University welcomed a visitor from South Africa: Adele Grosse. She had come here on the invitation of Trivium Lindenhof and FICE to share her evidence-based methodology.
Adele Grosse is founder of IN TOUCH PARENTING and founder the PROUD2B ME Foundation, a community development organisation that provides family preservation programmes.
As all (working) parents all over the world realise on a daily basis, it is a struggle sometimes to balance the priorities in your lives, especially if jobs are very demanding. But sometimes, no matter how important everything else feels, you have to take a step back and realise that parenting your child is more important than cleaning the house or getting some extra work done, Adele claims. And how right she is. By association, I can still remember the surprising and urgent appeal that a keynote speaker made at the end of his address at a major European social work conference in Parma, Italy (in 2007): "don't forget to be a social worker in your own family too !".
Although parenting means different things to different people, parenting is in fact a skill that needs to be learned and mastered by each and every parent.
It's exactly this issue that Adele Grosse addresses, "remember a responsible parent = a responsible home = a responsible child !" All too often we tend to forget that parents' behaviour has a huge impact on children: "children see, children do".

Habits die hard and there's always a reason to continue things the way they are. Making changes is not easy, so realising that, Adele set out  to develop a tool kit and a unique 5-week programme based on four pillars, each pillar being covered within a week. The focus of the four pillars is on:

• role & responsibility (as youth/parent/educator)
• self-esteem & affirmation
• effective communication skills
• values & discipline

This preservation programme bases itself on the assertion that: a responsible me = a responsible home = a responsible school = a responsible community = a responsible nation.
By approaching the tasks of parenting from 3 different angles (youth, parents and educators) simultaneously and by working in support groups, a longer lasting change can be achieved. Moreover, by this joint effort these 3 parties learn to speak the same language of transformation, making the change more sustainable in the communities as well. As this methodology was seen to bring change and hope to the communities and townships in South Africa, interest in this unique model grew in different parts of the country.
With appealing posters and short videos, the message was spread : "Each of us has the ability to change things around us by becoming the change WE wish to see in this world. Come on SA, let's demolish the bad habits in our communities! "
In her heart-felt, inspirational presentation Adele made the audience realise more than anything else that our societies desperately need wholesome and responsible parents who empower their children to reach their full potential by creating a loving, nurturing environment that strengthens the family and society. 
"Change starts with me .... everything starts with me .... Don't think it, ink it" ! Get up and get started, why wait any longer ? That's how Adele Grosse has done it and achieved so much.

What's so special about social work ?

By coincidence I stumbled on this intriguing question during one of my surfing expeditions on the web. Intriguing for social work professionals, you might say ? Well, to be honest, often in your day-to-day routines you get bogged down with a heavy workload and tend to forget the importance and essence of social work.

And luckily, you stumble on  Malcolm Payne's article , making crystal clear what is so special about social work and why it matters.

"Social work makes three main contributions to social justice, which are very distinctive.
First, it is concerned with the 'social': to improving social relations between people. Doctors deal with illness, lawyers with crime and individual injustices, teachers teach their pupils: social work uniquely sets out to improve relationships between people individually and collectively. Teachers or counsellors might help a child think through their worries, but it's social workers who visit the house, sit down and join with other members of the family to help sort out home problems.

Second, it focuses on people who lose out because they need housing or financial support but don't fit the criteria. Social workers try not to give up on people just because they don't fit in with the bureaucratic categories. Research over several decades shows that the people using their services value social workers trying to understand their problems and sticking with trying to get the best for them.

Third, social workers have always been prepared to intervene in social relations. It doesn't make them popular. Nineteenth century campaigners complained about early social workers interfering in other people's lives with their own moral agenda (or at least the moral agenda of the churches and the middle classes who funded early social work).

Complaints about social workers not intervening with an abused child, or a violent mentally ill man, or an isolated disabled or elderly person without family support just shows how useful it is to have a profession around prepared to have a go at helping to sort things out. In this way, social work helps to maintain the social fabric. That's why most countries have a social work profession."

Along these lines (and more) Payne held a presentation during the Stockholm Global Social Work Conference in July 2012. Here's a link to that 30-minute presentation, paving the way for 21st century social work.

My tip is: have your students listen to this easily understandable talk to the global social work community !

For those of you who don't know Malcolm Payne: he is a writer, blogger, consultant, educator on social work and end-of-life care. Here's a link to his tweets.