Internationally, it is generally said that professionals engaged in social work are social workers, referred to as social workers. At present, it is recognized that social workers are called "social engineers", which are in the buffer zone between the government, society and individuals and play the role of "lubricant", which is of positive significance to social stability. For many people, although the concept of social worker is still a little strange, the castle peak can't be covered. After all, it has already flowed to the East. Nowadays, this mysterious and immature brand-new profession stands out and gradually emerges.
Building a harmonious socialist society is inseparable from the strong support of "social workers". In Chinese mainland, social work, a profession that has never been known by people, started to heat up sharply from 20 12. It is most appropriate to describe the explosion trend of social workers with "high-profile appearance".
The "Decision" of the Sixth Plenary Session of the Party clearly proposed to build a huge contingent of social workers. For the first time, "social worker" was written into the central document and promoted to the height of national strategy, which is the first time in the history of our country. When the country builds a team from the institutional level, social workers are not vague and unfamiliar occupations mixed in communities and welfare institutions. It began to stand out in people's field of vision, which indicates the arrival of social work spring and the beginning of a new era of social work, and also indicates that the social work profession will enter a new period of vigorous development. To be sure, "social work" is a key word of the upcoming 18th National Congress, which is a great encouragement to social workers all over the country and a great boost to their professional development.
On October 2012165438+2410, good news came from Shenzhen: the construction of social workers' talent team entered the task of civil affairs for the first time, and it was ranked as three teams of civil affairs work together with civil affairs cadres and workers and social volunteers. The Ministry of Civil Affairs announced that during the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, China's civil affairs system should strive to train more than 65,438+10,000 social workers, set up social work posts in all civil affairs service institutions, public welfare social organizations and private social service institutions, and equip them with corresponding social work professionals. At the end of 20 12, the first social work college in China was established in China Youth Institute for Politics.
Social work specialty is facing important development opportunities. From training, certification to job placement, the state has provided a green channel for this "unpopular" occupation. More importantly, the birth of this profession, because it will inject professional and fresh blood into public welfare undertakings, and will also give birth to surging power for its own development. Several social worker job fairs held in Shanghai on 20 12 can prove this point. At the job fair, a large number of applicants flocked to the job fair, and the popularity of the scene greatly exceeded people's expectations. The total number of applicants has also more than doubled compared with the first batch of 20 1 1. At the same time, those who apply for social work posts have higher educational level than before. Undergraduate students, even high flyers, who came back from studying in Britain and Australia, also joined the application. No wonder some experts say that "the spring of social work has come".
The development of social workers in China began with professional education. From 65438 to 0988, Peking University established the first social work major after the reform and opening up, and began the reconstruction process of social work professional education. By the end of 20 12, nearly 200 colleges and universities across the country had set up social work majors, forming a three-level school-running pattern of junior college, undergraduate and graduate students. At the same time, some provinces and cities, such as Shanghai, Chongqing and Jiangsu, have also established self-study examination systems for social workers. The vigorous development of social work education has laid a solid talent foundation for the construction of professional level evaluation system for social workers and the development of social work specialty.
In 2000, inspired by the development of social workers in Hong Kong, the Ministry of Civil Affairs of the People's Republic of China began to put forward the idea of establishing a professional qualification system for social workers to the Ministry of Personnel, and in early 2003, it issued the Notice on Strengthening the Construction of Social Work Team to the civil affairs departments of provinces and cities, actively advocating that qualified provinces and cities boldly carry out the pilot work of social work professionalization system construction. In 2003, Shanghai took the lead in establishing a professional qualification system for social workers. In the same year, Jiangsu Province established a social worker level grade examination system, and Zhejiang Province established a social work and management post qualification certificate examination system. Beijing, Tianjin, Fujian, Chongqing, Guangzhou, Ningbo and other cities have also explored and piloted the construction of social work professionalization system. Although the national unified social work career evaluation has not been officially carried out, it is gratifying that it has begun.
On May 16, 2004, the Ministry of Labor and Social Security issued the National Professional Qualification Standard for Social Workers, which stipulated the job requirements, theoretical knowledge and skill operation of social workers' profession from the perspective of work standards, and social workers were officially recognized as a new profession in China. However, it focuses on the establishment of vocational skill qualification system, and its position in vocational appraisal is slightly lower, tied with technicians. In the west and Hong Kong and Taiwan, social workers are professional and technical personnel. In view of this, on July 20, 20 12, the Ministry of Personnel and the Ministry of Civil Affairs jointly issued the Interim Provisions on the Assessment of Social Workers' Professional Level and the Implementation Measures for the Professional Level Examination of Assistant Social Workers and Social Workers, which brought social workers into the professional technical category for the first time. 20121213, the National Expert Committee on Professional Level Evaluation of Social Workers was established in Shenzhen, which means that the professional level evaluation of social workers in China has an authoritative guiding body since then, marking another step forward in the construction of the professional level evaluation system of social workers in China.
At the same time, the way out for social workers is also one of the key issues for the country. The national civil affairs department will take the lead in setting up social work posts in the fields of social welfare, social assistance, community building, rehabilitation of the disabled, public welfare non-governmental organizations, family life services, etc., so as to attract social workers through multiple channels and improve the professional social service level in the civil affairs field. Beijing announced that during the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, social workers such as neighborhood committee directors, village committee directors, community service personnel and funeral workers will evaluate junior, middle and senior titles and consider corresponding treatment. The Interim Provisions on the Professional Qualification of Social Workers in Guangzhou recently issued by Guangzhou pointed out that social workers can obtain professional qualifications through identification, examination and evaluation, and even foreigners from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan and living in Guangzhou can declare their professional qualifications.
Social workers have a history of hundreds of years in western developed countries. The proportion of professional social workers in the total population is 2‰ in the United States, 5‰ in Japan and 2.2‰ in Canada. Registered social workers in Hong Kong alone account for 1.7‰ of the total population. According to the standards of developed countries and regions, China needs at least 2 million professional social workers, that is, 2 million jobs. At present, there are more than 22 million urban minimum living allowances, more than 65 million rural people with absolute poverty and low income, more than 82 million disabled people, more than 4.6 million special care recipients, 573,000 orphans, 65.438+43 billion elderly people and 65.438+0 billion people suffering from disasters all the year round. But by the end of 20 1 1, there were only 453,000 people actually engaged in social work in China's civil affairs system. In terms of workload, an average of 1 staff has to serve 1 10,000 key civilian objects, which is far from countries and regions with mature social work. From this point of view, there is a big gap in social workers' talents, and the social work profession is of great use.
According to the new national standards, social work posts will be divided into four categories: first, public service and social management departments at all levels, such as civil affairs departments, workers, young women and other major business departments of people's organizations, should be equipped with social work professionals to improve the setting of social work posts; Second, public service institutions, such as various social welfare service institutions, social assistance institutions, special care and resettlement institutions and other institutions that provide social services, should set up a large number of social work posts; Third, communities, including streets and neighborhood committees, should set up a large number of social work posts and use social workers in social work institutions such as community service centers and social workstations in combination with community characteristics; Fourth, a large number of private public welfare and charitable social organizations and private social service institutions, such as pension institutions, institutions for the disabled and youth service institutions, should be equipped with necessary full-time social workers to provide professional services. It can be seen that the main employment fields of social workers are: schools, enterprises, medical social work institutions, elderly welfare institutions, correctional institutions, community departments, social security departments, youth work institutions, marriage counseling institutions, family social work institutions, residential quarters and so on.
In foreign countries, social workers are the income level of the middle class. In Hongkong, China, the salaries of graduates majoring in social work are generally about 20% higher than those of graduates from other majors. The average junior social worker's monthly salary is 1.2 ~ 1.8 million Hong Kong dollars, and the senior social worker's annual salary can reach more than 400,000 yuan. Social worker is a brand-new occupation in China. What standard should its salary be? Are there any related occupations for reference? Is the current income level of social workers directly proportional to the professional work they have paid? And so on, at present, the country is strengthening the research on these issues, and it is expected that relevant policies and measures will be introduced soon to provide a place for professional social workers. Recently, Shanghai said that the "Implementation Measures for the Promotion of Community Social Workers in Shanghai" will be issued soon, which clearly stipulates the salary and position that social workers deserve, and the monthly income of mature "first-class social workers" is expected to exceed 10,000 yuan.
Like other new things, social work specialty, as an innovation, is an irreversible necessity and trend of the development of the times. Because of this, it is inevitably restricted by such factors. Lack of standardized post setting, scientific professional standards, effective incentive mechanism and good social recognition are the common reasons for the slow career development of social workers in China.
For a long time, social workers have been in an "unpopular" state, and even most people mistake social workers for simple "neighborhood work" and "things done by the elderly" On the whole, the professionalism of social workers is not high. At present, the vast majority of on-the-job social workers have not received professional study, and a few social workers who graduated from colleges and universities have poor practical ability. Although some social workers have been trained or introduced, the education and level of the existing employees are generally low, most of them have not received systematic social work education, their working methods are relatively backward, it is difficult to provide personalized, diversified and systematic services, and they lack industry self-discipline and evaluation, so they cannot effectively cope with and solve new and complex social problems. For example, Pudong District of Shanghai is a 20 12 judicial social worker pilot area, but most of its social workers are transferred from the judicial system or recruited by the society, and the proportion of real social professional background is less than 1%.
Social work specialty also faces a series of institutional obstacles. For example, there is an obvious gap between the professional and technical personnel status and salary of social workers, the professional qualification certification has not played an effective role in enhancing the "talent value", and the professional qualification certificate is not linked to the professional title and does not match the post allocation. There is a lack of uniform standards for talent recruitment, the service value has been underestimated for a long time, the system of government purchasing social work services has not been established, the reform of employment system in administrative institutions is relatively backward, various social organizations are underdeveloped, and financial input at all levels is insufficient. These factors lead to the brain drain of a large number of social workers, which seriously affects the vigorous development of social workers' profession. It is reported that less than 10% of social workers in Peking University are engaged in frontier social work after graduation. China Youth Political College has a higher proportion. Social work graduates take postgraduate entrance examinations, go abroad and flow to other industries, and the turnover rate is not less than 40%. In 20 12, the number of applicants for Shanghai social workers' vocational qualification examination decreased by nearly 40% compared with 20 1 1. Among them, Fudan University, where "social workers" are relatively concentrated, has 22 graduates in the 20th12nd session, but only two of them are actually engaged in the social work industry and only three are engaged in related industries. Today, social workers have just started, and more and more "social workers" are "expecting" policy makers to introduce clearer and more powerful policies.
It takes time for a new profession to be valued, and our observation still takes time. In practice, some places have actively explored: for example, Guangzhou Dongshan Liwan and other places have accepted the concept of social work and launched the "home-based care for the elderly" service, while Panyu Liwan and other places have tried to set up anti-drug social workers. I hope a single spark can start a prairie fire. This is not only the blessing of social workers, but also the necessity of promoting the development of social work, which is ultimately conducive to coordinating economy and society and building a harmonious society.