Abstract
Not many countries have developed their national professional competence framework. In 2018, Croatian Chamber of Social Workers initiated a collaborative project to research professional competencies of social workers in partnership with Social Work Study Centre at the Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb. Project was supported by Ministry of Demographics, Family, Youth and Social Policy and Croatian Association of Social Workers. However, it was challenging to develop national framework and avoid the trap to copying competence framework developed in another context. The process of developing national framework will be described in this chapter on the example of Croatian experiences. In first step, we made an exhaustive literature review of national frameworks and research instruments. The overall list was reviewed several times and adjusted to Croatian language. Second phase included qualitative research with social work practitioners. An expert committee in the project reviewed final set of competencies. In third step, we conducted pilot research to validate research instrument. In final step, instrument was used in national survey with more than 900 social workers that work in social welfare centres. This process is informative for others researchers that would like to develop or review their national framework.
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Notes
- 1.
In Directive 2005/36/EC, Article 3 defines a regulated profession as “a professional activity or group of professional activities, access to which, the pursuit of which, or one of the modes of pursuit of which is subject, directly or indirectly, by virtue of legislative, regulatory or administrative provisions to the possession of specific professional qualifications; in particular, the use of a professional title limited by legislative, regulatory or administrative provisions to holders of a given professional qualification shall constitute a mode of pursuit. Where the first sentence of this definition does not apply, a profession referred to in paragraph 2 shall be treated as a regulated profession.”
- 2.
It involved a father on the island of Pag who threw his underage children from a balcony who consequently suffered serious injuries. The father was sentenced to thirty years in prison. In another instance, Croatia was shaken by the tragic death of a small girl Nikoll after receiving injuries from her mother.
- 3.
The expectation is that in 2022, the “social worker” occupational standard will be devised and adopted.
- 4.
We note that in the process of passing the new Social Welfare Act, in the course of the e-advice service, a total of 1809 objections were received, and officially, the view that these changes were contrary to the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia and the 2030 National Development Strategy of the Republic of Croatia was lodged by the following organisations: Croatian Chamber of Social Workers, Croatian Association of Social Workers and the Social Work Study Centre at the Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb.
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Opačić, A. (2022). Starting from Scratch: How to Conceptualise, Operationalise and Measure Professional Competencies in Social Work. In: Opačić, A. (eds) Social Work in the Frame of a Professional Competencies Approach. European Social Work Education and Practice. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-13528-6_6
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