Final post of 2012

Hello. Apologies if you've been wondering where I am, but I've been having a break at home away from all that technology gubbins. Today is my last day until January so I thought I'd get a quick post out to you to prove I still care. And of course there's the small matter of the world ending tomorrow, so I thought I'd get in before Mars attacks or whatever it was that the Mayans weren't predicting doesn't happen...

What I really wanted to bring to your attention was this report showing up failings in the care system. It was substantially reported by the media and you can find mention of it on the BBC website too.

That aside, I just wanted to say thank you for making this year so much fun for me. My teachings statistics have gone through the roof so thank you for turning up for training sessions and thank you for reading the blog.

Have a brilliant Christmas and good luck for 2013,

Alan

New report on child sexual abuse

The University of Bedfordshire has helped write a major new report looking at gang-related child sexual abuse in the UK. The report, released today by the Office of the Children's Commissioner (OCC), details how vulnerable children can end up being abused within gang settings and what can be done to help prevent this awful situation continuing. The initial recommendations include effective data sharing and awareness raising of the issue.

The OCC report can be downloaded from here. In addition, there are various interviews and audio clips detailing how the BBC reported the story here.

Finally, you can read UoB's own account of the report's release by having a look here.
If your studies in any way relate to issues of criminology or child protection I do urge you to take a look at what UoB, in some cases your own lecturers, have helped to produce. Thanks.

Offender mentors

Heard a story on Today programme this morning that I thought I'd share. This is one for anyone interested in the issue of reoffending rates in the UK. The government is about to launch a scheme which attempts to offer every short sentence prisoner a mentor, who will offer advice on how to avoid returning to crime. It's an interesting idea, despite the obvious sticking points of funding and supervising the scheme.

If you click here you'll be able to hear an interview with a former prisoner who benefited from just such a scheme.

I'm away for a while

Just a quick post to say I'm going to be away for a few weeks. This Thursday (22nd November) is my last day until 12th December.

So if you need resource-related help during this period you'll need to turn to any of my marvellous colleagues. Have a look here if you need to email people to make an appointment. As a first option I'd try Janine Bhandol or Sally Fensome who both cover areas within the social sciences.

I'm going to try a 3 week hiatus from all screen-related activity. That means no internet, no video games, no mobile phone and no TV. I might let you know how it went when I return.

'Rethink Mental Illness' report criticises schizophrenia care in the UK

You may have already heard about the new schizophrenia report, The Abandoned Illness which is published today. Still, I think this is too big an issue to not publicise it further. Although I know you're probably not studying straight psychology, serious mental illness is an issue that informs so many other areas of the social sciences. That's what makes the report and debate well worth an in depth look.

Rethink Mental Illness (RMI) is a charity launched to support people with and change attitudes to mental illness in the UK. They commissioned the report and the Schizophrenia Commission gathered the data and wrote it. It broadly covers within its 88 pages what is going wrong, what needs fixing and how it can be paid for.
There's a lot in there, but it's extremely readable.

If you'd like some more background details I'd have a look here for a BBC interview with a spokesman from  the RMI or you can find the Guardian's reporting of the issue here.

The full report on the current state of schizophrenia provision in the UK is available in full from here.

A short play to explain secondary referencing.

The Scene: A pub with three men sat at a very long bar. Two of the men, Evan and Thomas are sat next to each other and the third, Alan, is on his own at the far end.

Evan turns to Thomas.

Evan: Do you know the result of the Arsenal game?
Thomas: I saw Dave earlier who'd heard 5 minutes of radio and it sounded like Spurs were losing. I reckon Arsenal probably won.
Evan: We could always ask Alan. He did referee the game.

Thomas looks down the bar at the lone figure drinking his pint.

Thomas: I dunno. It's a long walk all the way down there. Shall we just assume Arsenal won?
Evan: Yeah. Let's do that.

THE END

"The problem is I haven't got time to read it"

Do you know what your most important task is at the moment?

Your task as a student, I mean. Not the other stuff that you need to do like attend to children/husband/wife/cat (delete as appropriate) or hold down a job whilst doing this. Forget about that stuff for a minute.

What I'm interested in finding out is what do you do as an individual that turns you into a student?

Indeed, are you a student as soon as you sign up and money changes hands? Or is it something equally prosaic like turning up for lectures now and again, handing assignments in on time and looking at BREO when you're told to?

You see I think it's reading.

My job is basically to show you how to find things. That's the easy bit. After that things sometimes get tricky. And sometimes the reason they get tricky is because students try and bypass that whole 'reading stuff' stage.

It's reading that transforms us into students. Reading books is the single most important reason why I'm not a gardener any more. I mean I read before I applied for university, but it was systematically reading academic texts about psychology that turned me into a student of the subject. It made me feel I could hold my own in an argument with others and incrementally I became happy with this new, more informed me. The temptation is to only read for a specific outcome, a specific assignment. So can I suggest you make the time to just read a couple of chapters from your textbooks each week which aren't tied to any specific thing?

It might seem odd to think that reading is part of your job at the moment, but I do think it's that fundamental. And it's fun to have your mind blown by authors suggesting new theories that hypothesise society in new ways.
I'm having to deal with just such a theorist now called Thomas de Zengotita who thinks that the ubiquity of screens has turned life into performance. Now by the time I've finished his book (called Mediated-yes, thanks for asking, we do have it in the library...) I may have rejected the central ideas he puts forward.
But (and here's the crucial point) I cannot reject his theory until I've read it.

OK. Enough of this.
As always, if you want to contact me about anything you know where I am.

New report on gang culture in the UK

I know this post will be of interest to you if you're studying youth justice, criminology or the general problem of gang culture. I also know a few of you are looking at choosing gang culture as dissertation topics so this will be definitely be worth taking a look at.

The Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) has just published a very readable report called 'Time To Wake Up' on what they feel needs to happen next to alleviate the problem. It's somewhat critical of the approach the police took of rounding up senior gang members after the riots last year, instead of addressing the issue of why people were joining gangs in the first place.

You can find the CSJ website here (have an explore as there's a few interesting pieces) and here is a link to the Today programme discussion that ensued.

DISCOVER: your feedback after the first month.

When the librarians started talking about killing the library catalogue (RIP: 2005-2012) in April we all said this is going to be mayhem. The students will all wail and light torches, the lecturers will have a collective breakdown and within minutes we'll be nostalgic for those simple days when you had to go to 37 different webpages to get access to lots of abstract only journals.

So to all the hundreds of students who've been remarkably positive and open about DISCOVER I'd like to say a big thank you, and a further thank you for proving my initial misgivings to be the groundless ramblings of a paranoid lunatic.

Manuel Castells

I saw on BREO the other day that Alex DeMont, a lecturer who I've a great deal of time for, had highlighted a radio 4 show called Analysis featuring a Q & A with Manuel Castells. If you haven't come across Castells before, he's a really interesting sociologist who has been predicting what the web might do to us as individuals for over a decade.

The radio 4 show is here. We also have plenty of his books (I've just ordered a couple of his older books as e-books too) on the shelves and I hope you'll find his theories intriguing.

Let me know if you do.

Illegal drugs and evidence based practice.

My last post concerning academic standards and social work prompted some really interesting emails from you, plus a spate of people unsubscribing. The unsubscribing may have been coincidental, but there's part of me that hopes it wasn't.

So I thought I'd better stay away from controversy for a while which is why this post is about drugs.

Do you see what I did there?

Anyway. The Today programme ran a piece on Monday concerning a new report from the UK Drugs Policy Commission (UKDPC) which has been 6 years in the writing; it's evidence based and offers some interesting ideas on tackling drug misuse in the UK. The subsequent debate between a UKDPC representative and Sarah Graham, who's the government's advisory council on illegal drugs, touched on the methodology of the report. Really interesting stuff.

The report itself can be found here and the audio of the debate is here (after the link opens, scroll down to 7:51 in the running order and you'll see it there). 

New scheme proposed to increase 'front-line social workers'

I nearly didn't blog about this because I didn't want any social work students to misconstrue my intentions.

So can I first state (not for the first time) that anyone prepared to come to UoB and do the course and be a social worker has my unadulterated admiration. Is that plain enough? Good.

With that in mind I thought I'd ask you for your opinion on this. Read it?

Just to give you some background details, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) who've published this report is a think-tank charged with coming up with radical solutions to perceived problems in different areas broadly related to public policy.

The full IPPR report on the proposed changes required to social work is available here.

I would be very interested on whether you think the educational standard of social workers is one of the issues effecting the perceived low status of the profession.

John Pitts' 'Spinning the Crisis' lecture

Are you studying criminology? Then this is for you.

John Pitts is one of our best known lecturers at UoB, focussing on youth crime and gangs. A few months ago he gave a lecture on the fall out from the UK riots last year.

Unfortunately I couldn't go on the actual night, but thanks to some bright spark videoing it the whole thing is now on YouTube. I'll be checking back in a week or so to see if the number of views online has increased!
I hope it does as it's an interesting talk.

The findings of the safeguarding report in Rochdale

I suspect you may have already read about how a number of teenage girls in Rochdale were abused, resulting in the men who perpetrated these crimes going to prison.

The subsequent report that these events prompted can be viewed and saved by clicking here.

I also heard an interview on Woman's Hour with one of the girls who was abused. Inevitably it's pretty upsetting stuff, but it does give some insights into how the abuse continued for so long. I'm not sure how long the link will work for (the BBC only leave their stuff on iplayer for so long) so my advice would be to listen to it as soon as possible. The interview is the first feature on the programme and can be heard here.

As always, let me know if you want more information on how to find reports online.

Welcome back.

Hello again. You're looking fabulous after a good break I see.

After a summer of swanning around the south of France with kings, knaves and Lana Del Ray I suppose it's about time I got back to work myself. Sorry the blogging has been quiet in the last few months. The genuine reason is that with many of you not around I decided to work on other projects for a while.

But I'll be sending out posts regularly again from this week onwards. Many of these will certainly mention DISCOVER. I want you to learn to love DISCOVER. Not just like it, but truly love it. Because the old library catalogue is no more and DISCOVER is so much better. I know that 'new and improved' often means 'new and about the same, but more expensive'. Well in this case I really do think DISCOVER has made searching for information easier.

If you haven't had a go yet then DISCOVER can be found here. You'll need to use your log in as it contains journals as well as books and everything else we have electronic access to.

If you're reading this you're probably a second or final year student. Which also means you'll be used to searching the databases one at a time. And that's where DISCOVER wins. Not just wins, but wins and gloats about it by singing "I AM THE CHAMPION" at unedifying volume. Because DISCOVER searches all the databases at the same time and that's even better than two weeks in France with Lana Del Ray.

Trust me. I should know.

New e-crime figures announced.

This is an interesting one.

The British Retail Consortium (BRC) released a report this morning showing a big increase in electronic crime (or e-crime) in the UK. The most common type of e-crime involved some form of identity deception in purchasing goods.

One thing I learned from the report is that the UK has the biggest internet spend per-capita of any nation, so the potential for online fraud is huge.

The report isn't huge, but it's fact with good stats and you can find it here.

New research proposes link between the increase in suicide rates and the recession

Firstly, I want to acknowledge that suicide is quite a difficult subject to discuss. I know that many issues within your subject area are tough but that clearly isn't a reason for me to steer clear of them on Bedtimes and Deadlines. So when I heard this morning of new research looking at the link between increases in suicide rates and current unemployment/recession figures, I thought it worth sharing.

You can read The Guardian's account of the research, published in the British Medical Journal, by clicking here.

If you'd prefer to just head straight to the report then go here.

There are a few recommendations in there that seem quite reasonable; none more so than a call for support staff in job centres to be aware of customers showing worrying levels of depression. As always, if you'd like me to show you how to access mental health research then just ask.

The Riots: In Their Own Words

Tonight (August 13th) will see the first of a two part series of programmes being broadcast on BBC2 at 9pm covering last summer's UK riots. Tonight's show features the words of people who took part in the rioting (their words are voiced by actors) whereas next week will feature interviews with the police.

It promises to be an engaging and insightful account of what occurred. Have a look here for some trailers and further information on how the programmes came to be made.

The UK riots: one year on.

A year ago I blogged in the immediate aftermath of the UK riots by highlighting the 'broom army'. Slowly, more analysis emerged; sometimes biased , sometimes contradictory, always troubling. The one year anniversary of the rioting has provided another opportunity to reflect. It is a particularly interesting time to reflect on such upsetting events whilst in the midsts of what has (so far!) been a wildly successful London Olympics.

On this morning's Today programme there were two pieces on the 2011 riots.
One gave a voice to the rioters themselves, whereas the other interviewed Chief Constable, Ian Learmonth.

I've got more pieces I'd like to share with you on the analysis of the 2011 riots, but I'll spread them out over the next few weeks.

The library catalogue is dead; long live Discover.

First thing's first-nobody panic. OK?

Take deep breaths and put the kettle on if that'll help.

Ready?

Now. I've got some big news for you-the library catalogue is being replaced by a newer, better, simpler, smarter and sexier interface called Discover. It's all coming via one simplified search box, courtesy of EBSCO.

And it's really good.

If you've used any of EBSCO's databases before then the look of Discover won't phase you in the slightest. But the advantages are that you can search across books and journals via one search box.

If you're a returning first or second year I'll be demonstrating Discover to you in induction sessions when you return. I'm just mentioning it now so it's less of a shock come the new term and rest assured that although it's new it's also very easy to use - you'll be finding things within minutes! If you want to email me with any concerns or questions at this stage then feel free. I really don't mind.

New domestic violence statistics

On Saturday 23rd The Guardian reported that domestic violence conviction rates are at an all time high by writing this. The improvement has in part been explained by the efforts of Keir Starmer, the director of public prosecutions, who when appointed instigated a four year plan to improve things.

There are some interesting statistics mentioned in there so I'd take a look if it's an area that interests or concerns you.

Major new report on household income published

Any long term readers of this blog will know I'm a big fan of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, an organisation focussing on poverty in the UK and publishing many high quality reports on related topics.

Well they've produced another very interesting piece of work, examining wages and how it relates to standards of living. What the new report does is look at how much money a family of four requires to maintain a Minimum  Income Standard (MIS) and predicts how forthcoming changes to tax credits will put more families under financial strain.

The research method involved talking to 21 focus groups and reveals some very interesting data concerning what are considered 'essentials' to modern life. To take a look at the full-text just click here and follow the links. There was also a debate on the Today Programme this morning and you can listen to the discussion from here.

It's well worth a look and listen.

The Welfare State discussed on the Moral Maze this week

Hello.
First thing's first; in case you've never come across it before The Moral Maze is a discussion programme on Radio 4. The format is 3 or 4 people with opposing views discuss an issue and 'witnesses' are called during the debate to highlight specific issues. It's often quite 'lively'.

The programme last night was a discussion of what and who the welfare state is now for.

It's very good and covers many issues which I know you'll have discussed in lectures.

According to iplayer the link to the show is permanent, but I'd click here and have a listen soon-just in case!

Randomised Control Trials pt 2...

Yesterday I wrote a post on Ben Goldacre's government funded report looking into how RCT's can be used in the sphere of social policy.

This morning Goldacre was on the Today programme talking about the report so I thought I'd send you the link to the audio.

So here it is.

Evidence Based Practice and Public Policy - the future

Hello again. I know you may be having a well deserved rest from studying at the moment, but I've got something that I think is worth sharing...

One of my favourite people to follow on Twitter is a man called Ben Goldacre, a doctor and writer who's best known for his Bad Science column, originally published in the Guardian. He specialises in attacking the misuse of statistics, often by the media.

I mention this because he, along with three other experts, has written a new report for the Cabinet Office on how Randomised Control Trials (RCT's) can be implemented in areas of Public Policy. In case you're new to research skills RCT's are where you basically take two (well, usually two) groups and introduce some particular stimulus (for example, participation in a particular drug rehab programme for people suffering with drug problems) for half the participants.


The 'random' part of dividing the RCT's population into groups is crucial. Without that element you'll often get a skewed result due to volunteers being positively biased to succeed to begin with. At the end of the trial you try and ascertain whether the drug programme group are healthier/happier/ than the control group who haven't taken part in the programme. In a nutshell, this supposedly simple method is what we call 'evidence based practice'.

The new report looking into how RCT's can be used in the area of Public Policy is called 'Test, Learn, Adapt'. I think it's really interesting and thankfully it's pretty straightforward to comprehend. Read or download it from here.

I'll happily talk to you about statistics and research methods if you need assistance with that side of things. At the very least I can suggest some decent resources to make the issues clearer.

Right. You can get back to your summer now...

Kicked Out Kids TV programme

My attention has been brought to a TV programme that was shown the other night concerning children who are in danger of getting thrown out by their parents. Its's a BBC 3 show but don't let that put you off!

Having watched some of it this morning it seems communication (or lack of it) is key. Just for a change.

Anyway. It's on i-player for another week or so and you can find it from this link.

Series of pieces on London gangs

I was listening to the Today programme this morning and heard a 7 minute piece on gang rivalries in London.

You can listen to it here. I think there's a separate report covering gangs every day this week so I'd recommend  returning to the Today website later in the week (or listening live, of course) to get a round up.

In (sort of) related news, the Government has announced a major new scheme to help 'troubled families'. The Guardian reported the story like this. There's also a quick video about the same story here courtesy of the BBC website.

What this blog needs is more music about social workers...

...so here's the video for Glasvegas doing Geraldine, a song singing the praises of a social worker. No, really.

Next post will have some proper 'academic' content.

Promise.

New report into how the homeless are treated in hospital

Not sure if the timing is ideal for you, but a new report commissioned by the DoH offers detailed evidence of how the homeless are being failed by some hospitals discharging patients back onto the streets. There are also examples of good practice so it's not a universally grim picture.

Anyway. The full report is available by clicking here or if you don't fancy the full 42 page report have a look here at the DoH summary of the findings along with some other relevant links.

If you're in any doubt on how to reference NHS reports just ask.

New CAFCASS report shows regional variations in care applications

CAFCASS released new figures today showing how care applications differ in number from around the UK.

It has already been suggested that the geographically uneven instances in care applications are due to variations in how social workers interpret the guidelines on what constitutes an immediate threat to a child's safety. Newspapers are inevitably jumping to quick conclusions about what these figures actually mean.

As always with these reports it's best to go straight to the original source and you can view the CAFCASS figures from here.

Also the BBC are covering it by mentioning the findings within the wider context of baby P which doesn't seem unreasonable I suppose.
If you want to share an opinion I'd be interested to hear it.

The Social Care Reform Bill, part 212 and rising...

The latest twisty turny development of what the Social Care reform bill might mean to both practitioners and service users has been revealed. An open letter written by eighty-five interest groups has been published in today's Daily Mail detailing concerns of the bill being watered down, hijacked or endlessly delayed.

I know I've mentioned it before, but it will be enormously important whatever it contains, both for users/practitioners and for the reputation of this government.

There's an interview with a typical service user available from here and BBC's website this morning was reporting the story like this.

I don't visit the Daily Mail website very often as it tends to make me want to break things, but click here if you want to view their reporting of the open letter. Just try and ignore the various celebrity stories down the right hand side, if possible!

Hello again to the new Early Years students.

I don't often post to specific groups because it's the blogging equivalent of going to a party populated by fabulous and intelligent people and then only talking to one person all night. So forgive me if you're not an EY student.

I just wanted to welcome you all again properly and remind you that I'll be here most of the summer. So if you do want some more pre-season training you've only to ask.

I may well have mentioned this before but as a first step I'd have an explore on lrweb which are the library web pages covering information and resources.

If (and I know this is an 'if' so big it's probably visible from space) you have some idea of a dissertation topic already, and would like to have a guided tutorial on finding resources to support it then contact me by replying directly to this email. Or you can use my university email which you can see here along with a short description of what I actually do.

And I promise I'll circulate round the party more at the next get together and not stay in the kitchen talking to one person.

The Invention of Childhood

I'm about to share a terrific thing with you and I honestly cannot take any credit for this whatsoever.

In 2006 the former Children's Laureate, Michael Morpurgo, who is probably best known for writing War Horse, presented a series on Radio 4 called The Invention of Childhood. It's a brilliant series covering 1000 years of history; from the Norman conquest to the 20th Century, but focusing on what it meant to be a child at various key historical points.

I'm not sure if the content is relevant to anything you may be working on at the moment, but if you need 20 minutes break from dissertation writing you could do much worse than have a listen.

You can find the original Radio 4 webpage, complete with some nice links to the OU, here.

If you want to listen to the series it begins here.

And finally, a big thank you to Leona for telling me it was being broadcast again.

For any final year students requiring dissertation support

I fear this is probably a reckless thing to mention at this stage but (here goes...) if you still need a one to one session covering any area of organising or researching your dissertation, now is realistically the latest you can ask. Hopefully, many of you will be handing in within the next fortnight or so.

With that in mind, please contact me now if there's anything realistic and practical I can do to help.

That aside, I wish all of you well who are on the final stretch.
And at this point I'd offer two pieces of advice-
1) Get at least 7 hours sleep a night.
2) Don't forget to eat.

I know, I know...I sound like your dad...again...

Record numbers of children being taken into care

New figures released today show that the number of children taken into care has topped 10,000 within a 12 month period for the first time.
This news is in every newspaper and all over the TV news. You won't have any problems finding it!
However, the statistics were compiled by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Services (CAFCASS), so if you want just the facts without the political analysis you can get straight to their website from here. This site is really useful for statistics going back to 2009.
From what I've read this morning most of the newspaper pieces refer back the baby P case as a catalyst for the steady increase in child removals. If you've an opinion you'd like to share I'd be glad to hear it.

'After the Riots' report looking at the August 2011 disturbances

Hello. Sorry for the long silence due to moving house, and thank you to those of you who wished us well. That's awfully sweet of you.

I'm breaking blogging silence to share the new report which was published today looking into the causes of the riots from August 2011. I think this one is for any student who is studying anything with the word 'social' in there somewhere! It's published by the Riots Communities and Victims Panel, an independent group put together by the Government, and I think it's not unfair to say that it's fired a few debates already.

The report broadly cites parental shortcomings, disenfranchisement of young people in society, educational exclusion and a suspicion of authority as contributing factors to the UK's worst street disturbances since 1995.

The subsequent debates seem to be focusing around the broadness of some of the findings. The first 16 minutes of Newsnight from yesterday is quite illuminating on this and can be viewed here. I've been looking at how the right and left wing media have been picking what they want from the report to back up their own views. Logging into Newsbank UK and searching for the report is the easiest way to do this.

Anyway, all those things aside the main report on the riots can be found here. Any comments or questions you have will always be welcome.

I'm moving house this week.

I'm only telling you this because it means that I won't be in work or blogging until mid-March at the earliest.
It did cross my mind to try and link moving house with some research on stress and anxiety, but as I've discovered again today, moving house is more stressful than writing dissertations, having children and being an Arsenal fan by a mile and a half. My advice would be stay where you are forever.

If you need any urgent help in the immediate future you can see if one of my colleagues is free to offer advice. Their contact details are here. We all offer similar help so you'll be well looked after.

Clare's Law update.

There was a 5 minute discussion on the Today programme yesterday detailing the ongoing debate to bring into being 'Clare's Law', which proposes that women will be able to conduct background checks on potential partners to see whether they have previous convictions for domestic abuse.

The programme link here will work for 7 days so don't delay if you're interested in this issue.

If you'd like some extra background info on this whole debate the Guardian had a good piece on the whole issue yesterday. You can read it from here.

New report into care and the elderly

A new NHS report called 'Delivering Dignity' has been released today and unsurprisingly has been garnering quite a bit of press. It's an investigation looking at how the elderly are being treated in both hospital and care home settings. I expect you'll be more interested in the care home side of things, although I shouldn't make assumptions.

Anyway, the report is available from here but bear in mind this is just an interim version. When the full version is published I'll be sure to share it with you.

Finally, if you are working on any assignments relating to the elderly as a vulnerable group in society (hint, hint)  this may be particularly useful new piece of new research to use.

Proud and Prejudiced.

Channel 4 are broadcasting Proud and Prejudiced tonight at 10pm, the everyday story of two extremist groups, diametrically opposed in their views who just happen to share a town-Luton.

I really wasn't sure whether to post about this or not, but even if the programme can't be referenced for any particular assignment this is an issue that surely affects everybody in Luton, no matter what your political and religious beliefs.

If this post doesn't arrive before 10pm (sometimes emails are delayed by Feedburner, for some reason) and you can't watch it live, here is a link to 4od where you'll be able to watch it online from tomorrow.

Thomas's impressions of a university library.

You'll need to forgive me this one as this is a very self-indulgent post. I promise the next message will be all about academic gubbins.

Thomas, my 10 year-old, was asked to write a piece for his creative writing lesson at school and he decided to imagine what the atmosphere is like within the library at UoB. Below is his piece...

As I enter the university, noises collapse upon me, like a stack of bricks unbalanced. People hurrying to lessons and lectures like little mites in a mound. Left, right and centre coffee shops stand, people nattering away to friends without a care in the world.

Complex works of incredible humane art, showing just how small we are in the size of the weird and wonderful world we live in. Lecturers babbling pointlessly away on subjects with and without meaning.

The endless libraries with countless pages being turned create a tuneless orchestra of infinite sound. From within offices there is the sound of fingers tip-tapping on keyboards, not unlike the sound created when a hamster nibbles on a sunflower seed.

Countless pens scribbling on paper, shaping their lives with ink. This is a place of infinite possibility.


I hope you liked that. I think I prefer his idealised version of the library to reality. And any lecturers reading this - I have never suggested to him that there's any babbling going on!

The much delayed welfare system post has arrived

There's a lot to read here but if you're looking for information on welfare systems stay with it-it'll help.

I've been getting a lot of enquiries about the welfare assignment, as I do every year.
So this post points you towards specific resources which may help you tackle what is a tricky assignment.

Firstly, a database that you probably won't have used before called Marketline offers very up to date social information (unemployment rates, economic forecasts, population distribution and social care statistics) on any country you can think of. I've blogged about how to use Marketline before so if you click here it'll take you to my previous instructions. Current statistics are invaluable in getting a good mark for this assignment. We know how fast the economic situation is changing in many countries at present and the research you'll find on Marketline is the most recent reliable data you can get. The reports are big (100 pages isn't unusual) so target the sections of the reports which are looking at social factors.

I also have two specific and quite new e-books I think are worth a recommendation.

The first of these is The Cameron-Clegg government: coalition politics in an age of austerity edited by Simon Lee and Matt Beech. It's from 2011. Chapter 7 is specifically looking at welfare reform so that's where I'd head first.


The second is The welfare state in post-industrial society: a global perspective by Jason Powell and Jon (Joe) Hendricks. It's from 2009. This book is split into two sections; the first half is looking at different issues relating to welfare (aging, immigration, healthcare...) and the second half is examining specific countries and how their welfare systems operate. Just bear in mind that things will have moved on in some countries in the last 2 and a bit years!


What I haven't mentioned yet is how to locate journal articles. From those training sessions I've done with individuals on this assignment, the most common problem is caused by students trying to find journals which compare two or three systems in one perfectly presented article. You're asking for too much! I think you need to separate out your searches and target individual countries (for example, search for "welfare state" or "welfare system" and Australia). Then your job is to compare the findings with whichever countries you decide to target. 


I told you there was a lot to read! Hope it all makes things a bit clearer and at least gives you some new ideas.

Evidence based health website examining inequality and race.

I owe this website recommendation to Janine Bhandol, the academic librarian responsible for nursing, so if you find anything useful you should be thanking her. The website is called Better Health and it publishes research which addresses inequalities in health between races living in the UK.

There's some terrific reports on here covering subjects such as the health of travellers, ethnic minority women and domestic abuse and BME and mental health issues. Some reports are unpublished (these are known as 'grey literature') and some are evidence based. If you need help with evaluating what you find then I'm happy to share my opinion.

Any student at any level who is studying an issue relating to health and race could find something of use on this website and it's available by clicking here.

Call for reform of women's prisons

Clive Chatterton, former governor of Styal women's prison, has been damning of the use of short term prison sentences for women. This morning (Friday 17th February) he was interviewed on Women's Hour. Luckily he was the first item on so if you listen from the start you won't have long to wait. Anyway, the show is here and it's a very interesting listen. Do remember that the link will probably only work for a week.

In addition, The Guardian reported his concerns too and the link to their piece is here.

This is a difficult topic, however listening this morning it seemed to me that it touches on many issues you may discuss in class and which I've mentioned on the blog previously; mental health, children in care and the length of sentences fitting the seriousness of the crime. Although the Corston report was published 5 years ago to look at these very issues, it would appear that little progress has been made.

If you'd like more information on any of the background studies mentioned you know what to do.

Some new e-books on safeguarding

To support the safeguarding assignment that I know some of you are preparing for (or putting the finishing touches to?!?) I've recently bought a few extra e-books on the subject. These won't all be on your reading list, but that shouldn't stop you from at least looking at the chapter headings and seeing what's on offer.
Today I've actually ordered another 3 titles on the subject which should arrive in about a week.

If you click here you can see a list of e-books that have safeguarding in the title.

As always, if you're having any issues around using e-books, let me know.

What is the most influential book on Earth?

If you were going to make a list of the top ten most influential books ever written I think there'd be some fairly straightforward inclusions; The Quran, The Bible, Darwin's The Origin of Species and Einstein's Theory of Relativity amongst others. A less obvious inclusion might be the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (usually referred to as the DSM). This book contains lists of symptoms which then define specific mental disorders and is used by the American Psychiatric Association and many UK based institutions.

The power of the DSM is in its ability to 'create' new mental disorders (as well as revise existing disorders) and as many of you know having studied the legal, social and personal ramifications of dealing with a mental health diagnosis, the fallout can be profound.

In the last week the DSM has become controversial all over again when details of the proposed new edition (DSM 5) started to emerge. This will have consequences for anyone working with people who have a mental health diagnosis and under the new guidelines a number of new symptoms have been medicalised as possible disorders. Amongst these are shyness in childhood and feelings of grief following bereavement.

As a psychology graduate whose course was heavily influenced by social constructionist principles, I find the issues surrounding diagnosis and stigma absolutely fascinating. Have a look at The Guardian if you'd like to read more on the current DSM 5 situation.

Do you want me to buy more books?

What's that?
You do?
I'm going to make two assumptions at this point; firstly, that you're reading this at all and secondly, you want me to buy more books.

Well now there's something practical you can do to make it more likely that my book budget will go further.

Currently VAT is charged at 20% on all e-books, whilst paper books are VAT-free. Quite frankly, this just isn't fair. So by putting your name to this e-petition you increase the likelihood of this being changed. When the petition reaches 100,000 names it has to be debated in parliament.

Even many of you leaving this year will benefit. You may not have an e-book reader today, but many of us will one day, so in the long run it'll make all paper books (they'll have to drop in price to compete) and e-books cheaper.

That's it. You can get back to your weekend now.
I'm off to play video games for 10 hours...

Cafcass report increase in children taken into care.

This week the Children's Court Advisory Service (Cafcass) released new figures showing a sharp increase in the number of children being taken into care. Many commentators have suggested this is as a result of social workers erring on the side of caution after the furore surrounding the Baby P case.

There were a few interesting and measured debates about the issue in the last few days (there were also a few unhinged slanging matches too but I'll steer clear of sharing those with you) and the Today Programme, as is often the case, hosted a brief and insightful discussion on the issue.

The first two episodes of Protecting Our Children, which is still available on iplayer, has certainly provided me with new evidence as to how finely balanced the decision to keep a child with their birth family or remove them can be.

Drop in training sessions.

As well as the training videos I'm currently working on I've been thinking of offering a series of training drop in sessions. For reasons of timetabling and room availability these would probably be at lunch time, possibly 12 until 2 and you'd just be able to turn up without booking.

As for the topics themselves, I was thinking of running sessions on;
1) All the databases that usually get forgotten in favour of SocIndex.
2) How to get the best out of a personal account in EBSCO.
3) Setting up alerting links within journals.
4) Using YouTube for research.
5) How to cook the perfect souffle.

If you'd like to recommend any other areas where a training session would be beneficial, either put a comment on here or email me with your suggestion.

Part 2 of Protecting Our Children

Just a reminder that BBC2 tonight (Monday 6th) at 9pm will be showing the second part of
Protecting Our Children.
Let's hope for some good outcomes for the people involved.

The Welfare Reform Bill, pt 761...

I've been resisting the urge to mention the Welfare Reform Bill for a while. Partly because it's a long way from concluding but mostly because I'm having trouble understanding it all.
As I write this it has been defeated six times in the House of Lords, but this doesn't seem to be fazing MP's who have already said all the amendments will be overturned when it reaches the House of Commons. So the next parliamentary debate will be tomorrow and I promise to watch Newsnight in an attempt to understand it better.

In the meantime, here is Maria Miller, Work and Pensions minister, being interviewed about proposed changes to the CSA which was one of the proposals which the Lords has delayed.

Oh, one more thing. I watched the 1st episode of the series following the newly qualified Social Worker last night and thought it was captivating. If you watched I'd be curious to know what you thought of it.

New TV programme on child protection

This one is a gift for anyone studying any aspect of child protection.

Tonight (Monday 31st January) is the first part of a three part series following a newly qualified social worker in her day to day activities. It's on BBC 2 at 9pm, but if this post doesn't reach you in time then you've always got BBC's iplayer as back up. There's some information on what the show contains (and how it got made at all) on the BBC website.

If you want to reference the programme in the future then ask me and I'll explain the format.

Let's hope the show is sympathetic to those who have to make tough decisions concerning children and families.

'Carers in Crisis' programme.

Hello. The only reason I'm blogging about this programme now is because one of you sent me an email and said is this worth a post? And the answer is a definite 'yes' in this case. The radio programme in question is an exploration of the various hoops that foster carers are required to jump through in order to offer their services. 

It's a pretty sober look at the problems which can be faced by adults wishing to take on the role of fostering children. Just remember it's one account of a very complicated issue.

One more thing. I'd be very glad to receive other recommendations from you (it could be TV or radio programmes, even websites maybe?) which you'd like me to promote here. I can't guarantee I'll agree to share everything you send, but I'd be glad to get your suggestions nonetheless.

The Cochrane database.

I've suggested before that reading the descriptions on the list of databases for your suject is a good idea. If you've ever done it you may have noticed that the Cochrane database is described as 'Gold Standard Research on Healthcare'.  And that's exactly what it is.

It's a collection of evidence based systematic reviews on a wide range of health topics. Many of these are concerning clinical drug trials so will probably not be relevant to your subject area, but there are also reviews looking at illegal drug misuses, mental health issues, childhood obesity and child protection.

If you're lucky enough to find what you're looking for don't be surprised if the reports turn out to be quite big (100 pages is common) so you'll have plenty of references you can track down too.

One more thing; Cochrane isn't from Ebsco so you'll need to save what you find the old fashioned way with the save icon.

And that's it. You can start searching it from here! If you want to know more then you get hold of me via the usual methods.

Hooray. Wikipedia is dead - for a day.

I know you don't put Wikipedia in your references, but you may well use it now and again to look up some background material for assignments.

Well not today you're not, because right now it looks like this.

If you want the background to this story then the BBC have done quite well to unpick the relevant details.

I don't really hate Wikipedia, I just think the people behind it have a hugely overblown opinion of themselves.
What they're mostly doing is having the longest argument in history but with fancy typewriters thrown in.

And 24 hours without that won't hurt anybody.

The National Student Survey

It may be the 17th of January already but happy new year. Sorry I've been a bit quiet since Christmas, but things have been somewhat hectic. I'm hoping 2012 calms down soon and I hope 2012 is kind and productive for you too.

This post is just to remind final year students of the importance of voting in the Nation Student Survey (NSS) this month.

Simply, my interest is in all of your experiences in using the library - that would include everything from the books on the shelves to the training and support you've received from me, and the survey is your chance to get those experiences recorded and seriously affect how the university is viewed in the future.

So if you know how things could be improved this is where you get to tell us, but equally if you feel that Learning Resources has supported you well in the past 2 and a bit years we really need you to tell us that too.

So here is the NSS survey - it'll be the most fun you have filling in a form all day. Promise.