Family Support Workforce Skills: In Search of Conceptualization

Information

Skills used in of family support workforce practice are implemented in different national, and system settings and professions. The conceptual assumptions and epistemological frameworks of diversity are a challenge in family support as a unique child-rights and child-protection perspective. Various paradigms of intervention, different sectors and disciplinary involvement indicate the need to systematize and clarify knowledge in the field. More precisely, we need to understand practical aspects of family support interventions related to skills that are generic (core) but also specific (if there is any). Another distinction could be done on the line of professionalization in professionals and paraprofessionals engaged in relevant social sub-systems what is being done within into one of the action work streams of the EU COST EuroFam-Net action. Conceptualisation of family support workforce skills implies delimitation of similarities and differences between family support and other skills used in helping, right-based and protection contexts. This creates opportunities regarding both standardization of workforce skills and transdisciplinarity across professional and paraprofessional workforces in family support field. Clear and logical conceptualization of family support skills is a prerequisite for their cataloguing, classification and typologicalization that can provide distinctiveness, wider recognition and facilitate the acquisition of skills needed by different professions and helpers in supporting the family. Conceptualization of family support workforce skills has been done throughout the process of mapping documents regarding skills of international, European and other organizations dealing with families from different perspectives, and then during systematic review of the literature and throughout complex guided discussion on clarification of the common understanding of key concepts, we are working on the conceptualization of family support skills.

Output type
Conference presentation
Year
2022