SWH200 Critically Reflective Practice in Organisations

Unit Outline: Semester 1 2024, Kelvin Grove, Internal

Overview

This unit engages you in critical examination of the professional role within contemporary organisational contexts. The unit integrates whole of course theory and practice by drawing on practice experiences from your field education placement as a stimulus for learning. The unit employs critically reflective approaches to learning and teaching about critical practice within contemporary workplaces characterised by neoliberal policies and managerialist practices. You will develop an understanding of ethical practice in organisations, informed by critical social theories, using a critical incident from your practice experience as a platform to develop your practice framework. This capstone unit links your own experiences with recent theoretical developments in professional practice for the social work and human services discipline. The unit focuses on building your organisational competence and professional confidence, as well as your commitment to critically reflective practice.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit you will be able to:

1. Critically analyse organisational and management theories to improve professional practice and leadership in contemporary human service agencies
2. Critically apply and synthesise social work knowledge, skills of critical reflection, values, and ethics to guide professional practice within diverse organizational contexts
3. Practise critical thinking, the application of critical theory and skills of crtiical reflection to professional practice in organisations
4. Critically evaluate personal needs for professional development and for responding to and managing change within the organisational context
5. Develop practice responses in an innovative and contextually responsive manner to work towards emancipatory change

Content

Learning Approaches

This unit utilises critically reflective pedagogic approaches to assist you to interrogate a real world critical incident from your own practice experience. The critical incident will highlight the ethical dimensions of professional social work practice within a contemporary organisation setting. The benefit of analysing critical incidents is that specific responses to critical incidents often have generic assumptions embedded within. The critical incident technique is rooted in the phenomenological research tradition and presumes that learners' general assumptions are embedded in, and can be inferred from, their specific descriptions of particular events. Critical analysis and reflection on professional practice in this way enables you to develop ethical responses to contemporary practice issues within organisations from a critical perspective. The unit adopts a blended learning approach, which includes lectures and tutorials in which you will engage in collaborative learning activities as critical peer supervisors around ethical practice in organisations. Participation in critical conversations with your peers and lecturers is an essential feature of learning in this unit.

This unit is one designated as assisting with your career development and employability because you will be performing in the role of social work or human service practitioner and undertaking critical reflection.

Feedback on Learning and Assessment

Feedback in this unit in provided in the following ways:

• A range of formative exercises will be discussed in class
• Comments on summative assessment work in addition to criteria sheets
• Generic comments back to the cohort via QUT Canvas
• Criteria sheet grading
• Feedback from peers, and tutor during in class discussion forums/critical incident presentations

Assessment

Overview

The first piece of assessment provides an opportunity for you to present and critically reflect on a chosen piece of practice and receive feedback from your tutor and your peers. The learning gained from this will inform your final piece of assessment, which provides a written analysis of your critically reflective approach to ethical practice in organisations. Each assessment item is designed to measure your ability to apply the knowledge and skills stated in the unit learning outcomes.

Unit Grading Scheme

7- point scale

Assessment Tasks

Assessment: Presentation (Oral, individual)

This assessment task requires you to identify and present a critical incident from a human services organisation in which you have worked (e.g. your field education placement organisation).

Your presentation should include a description of the organisational context and an initial reflective analysis of the incident. You should use the Guidelines provided on the Canvas site. The purpose of of the presentation is to elicit feedback and reflection from group members in your tutorial group, who will act as peer supervisors for you to enhance your practice within organisations. More specific requirements for this task will be discussed further in the first tutorial. 

Assessment: Essay

This essay focuses on critical and ethical practice within organisations and should be an in-depth critically reflective analysis of the whole critical incident, its relevant context, your experience of this, the learning gained from the analysis, and the subsequent practices attempted/proposed future practices. The analysis should take account of the ethical dimensions of professional practice and contemporary factors influencing organisational contexts. It should be linked with relevant critical theories covered in the unit, and should include identification of particular assumptions and values, critical reflection on these, deconstruction and reconstruction of your practice along critical lines, and end with a description of the critical skill/ practice framework for working ethically within challenging organisational settings.

This assignment is eligible for the 48-hour late submission period and assignment extensions.

Assessment: Discussion forum

This assessment task requires you to demonstrate your capacity to formulate and articulate appropriate critical reflection (i.e deconstruction and reconstruction) questions when you act in a peer supervisory capacity for fellow students in your tutorial group during their critical incident presentations. 

Academic Integrity

Students are expected to engage in learning and assessment at QUT with honesty, transparency and fairness. Maintaining academic integrity means upholding these principles and demonstrating valuable professional capabilities based on ethical foundations.

Failure to maintain academic integrity can take many forms. It includes cheating in examinations, plagiarism, self-plagiarism, collusion, and submitting an assessment item completed by another person (e.g. contract cheating). It can also include providing your assessment to another entity, such as to a person or website.

You are encouraged to make use of QUT’s learning support services, resources and tools to assure the academic integrity of your assessment. This includes the use of text matching software that may be available to assist with self-assessing your academic integrity as part of the assessment submission process.

Further details of QUT’s approach to academic integrity are outlined in the Academic integrity policy and the Student Code of Conduct. Breaching QUT’s Academic integrity policy is regarded as student misconduct and can lead to the imposition of penalties ranging from a grade reduction to exclusion from QUT.

Requirements to Study

Requirements

Nil

Costs

Nil

Resources

Resource Materials

Recommended text(s)

Gardner, F. (2016). Working with human service organisations (2nd ed.). South Melbourne: Oxford University Press.

Fook, J. (2016). Social work: A critical approach to practice (3rd ed.). London: Sage.

Other

Clegg, S., Kornberger, M., & Pitsis, T. (2008). Managing and organizations: An introduction to theory and practice. London: Sage.

Funnell, S., & Rogers, P. (2011). Purposeful Program theory: Effective use of theories of change and logic models (eBook). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Hafford-Letchfield, T. (2009). Management and organisations in social work (2nd ed.). Kent: Learning Matters.

Hasenfeld, Y. (Ed.). (2010). Human services as complex organizations (2nd ed.). Los Angeles: Sage.

Hughes, M., & Wearing, M. (2013). Organisations and management in social work (2nd ed.). Los Angles: Sage.

Jones. A., & May, J. (1992). Working in human, service organisations: A critical introduction. Melbourne: Longman Cheshire.

McDonald, C., Craik, C., Hawkins, L., & Williams, J. (2011). Professional practice in human service organisations. Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin.

Robbins S.P., Bergman R., Stagg I., & Coulter M. (2009). Management (5th ed.). Frenches Forest: Prentice Hall.

Risk Assessment Statement

There are no out of the ordinary risks associated with this unit.

Course Learning Outcomes

SW04 Bachelor of Social Work

1. Critique and apply coherent theoretical, practical and contextually relevant social work knowledge, skills and values, and cultivate a commitment toward meeting diverse clients and community needs. [Knowledge, Practice, Values and Disposition]
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
2. Construct and implement strategies for engaging in critical thinking and decision-making, utilising advanced research knowledge and skills to inform culturally safe practice, and promote social justice from diverse perspectives. [Practice, Knowledge, Values and Disposition]
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
3. Access, evaluate, and utilise relevant social work information that informs and assists in intra- and inter-professional communication in a range of contexts, through effective oral, written and digital interactions. [Practice, Knowledge]
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
4. Design a plan of action for working within socially progressive, anti-oppressive, culturally safe and ethical practice, that embody an autonomous and collaborative evidence-based orientation to social work, integral to the standards of professional social work practice. [Values and Disposition, Practice]
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
5. Critically examine tenets of diversity and diverse perspectives in social work, and advocate for a socially just society and the promotion of human dignity that reflect different social, political, cultural and historical circumstances, on the beliefs, values and aspirations of various groups, including Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations. [Values and Disposition, Knowledge, Practice]
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum

SW05 Bachelor of Social Work (Honours)

1. Critically evaluate theoretical, practical and contextually relevant social work knowledge, skills and values and, as a change facilitator, meet diverse client and community needs that promote social justice
   Relates to: Essay, Discussion forum
2. Formulate and implement strategies using advanced knowledge and research skills to analyse, consolidate and synthesise social and practice evidence to generate solutions and to inform professional practice and decision-making
   Relates to: Essay, Discussion forum
3. Develop advanced knowledge, skills and values, to inform culturally safe communication and effective intra- and inter-professional collaboration and with a wide range of audiences and contexts, including accessing, evaluating and utlising digital health information.
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
4. Construct and implement strategies for practising collaboratively and independently, focused on socially progressive, anti-oppressive, culturally safe and ethical practice, integral to the standards of professional social work practice
   Relates to: Presentation (Oral, individual), Essay, Discussion forum
5. Access, evaluate and utilise social work information to advocate for a socially just society and the promotion of human dignity and worth that reflect different social, political, cultural and historical circumstances, on the beliefs, values and aspirations of various groups, including Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations
   Relates to: Essay, Discussion forum