Dissemination – Social Work and Policing

Outreach and public relations

Sufficient time has been dedicated to networking and dissemination activities:

(1) Reaching out for other training institutions in social work and in other police units in the partner countries, where the SWaPOL training package may be implemented, and

(2) Collaboration with international associations and networks in the field of social work (EASSW European Association of Schools in Social Work EASSW), in the field of policing (EUCPN European Crime Prevention Network; CEPOL European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Training), and in the field of security and public order management of urban spaces (e.g. EFUS European Forum for Urban Security).

Multiplier Events

Multiplier Event are organised in all partner countries. The aim of these events is to reach out for new national partners (social work and in police administration) where the training may be adopted in the future.

Belgium: 29. Oct. 2020 (online)
Austria: 6. Nov. 2020 (online)
Portugal: Jan. 2021 (hybrid or online)

Conferences and public events:

Annemie Coone and Didier Reynaert (HoGent) are presenting the SWaPOL Curriculum at the international conference of UREKA – the Urban Research and Education Knowledge Alliance (hosted by Metropolia University of Applied Sciences in Helsinki – online – 16./17. Nov. 2020)

Günter Stummvoll participated in the 31. Annual Conference of the European Society of Social Drug Reserach (Vienna – online – 25. Sept. 2020).

In 2019, the project SWaPOL was presented at the conference of the European Society of Prevention Research (EUSPR) in Ghent (16.-17. Sept. 2019), and at the conference of the European Society of Criminology (ESC) in Ghent (18.-21. Sept. 2019)

The project was presented at the Spring Meeting of the European Health Policy Group in April 2018 (Rotterdam), and at the Best Practice Conference of the European Crime Prevention Network EUCPN in Vienna in December 2018.

Recommended reading:

Policing Minors: Balancing Welfare and Justice

In this article, authors from Belgium discuss the history of the relationship of social workers and police in relation to youth justice in the city of Ghent. First, the historical development of the social role of the police is presented. Second, the separation of welfare and justice in the police zone of Ghent is explained. Third, the blurred lines in practice between social work and policing are discussed, emphasising the risk of role confusion, arbitrary judgements in case management and challenges for communication between social workers and police officers.

Biggs J. and Tang C. (2011): Teaching for Quality Learning at University. What the Student Does
Society for Research Into Higher Education. 4^th Edition. Open University Press. Maidenhead.
Parmar A. (2014): Methods of Social Work and Its Role in Understanding Team Climate and Team Effectiveness for Organizational Development. In: Journal of Sociology and Social Work. Vol. 2, Nr. 1. pp. 303-318. Published by American Research Institute for Policy Development.

Project meetings:

Kick-off Meeting: 18.-20. December 2018; Vienna, Austria
Second trans-national project meeting: 17.-19. June 2019; Gent, Belgium
The third trans-national project meeting was planned to be held in March 2020 in Lisbon (Portugal) and was actually held online on 26. June and 9. Sept. 2020.