The Importance of Social Work in Strengthening Families

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A robust case management system that includes skilled social workers is a critical factor in order to ensure permanence in family for every child.  In honor of National Social Work Month, we're highlighting four of the highly skilled social workers of our partner programs, whose photos are shown above.  Deborah Kanneh and Abdulai Massaquoi are part of the hardworking Case Management team at Child Reintegration Centre (CRC), Prezton Gonkerwon Vaye serves families in Liberia with Red Meets Green, and Silaty "Keke" Mansaray supports families in Freetown with Child and Family Permanency Services (CFPS).  These four exemplary social workers represent all of the skilled and experienced social works doing the often invisible work of strengthening vulnerable families.

Ensuring that vulnerable children find not only families, but permanence within those families, and empower vulnerable families to achieve their own independence and self-sufficiency doesn't happen in a vacuum.  When organizations like the CRC, Red Meets Green and CFPS find the families of children living on the street or otherwise separated from care, reuniting them with family isn't the end of the story - it's just the beginning.  And the hardest most difficult work is what comes next.  

The highly skilled social workers of agencies like these address each family's case holistically, identifying not just their needs, but their strengths as well, and building both the capacity of each family and their confidence in their ability to care for one another and to thrive.  The relationship between the case manager and the family is a partnership designed to help the entire family grow stronger.  This relational practice lets social works provide services working with the poor, rather than for the poor.  

Research shows that social work has one the highest burnout rates of any profession, probably due to the fact that these dedicate professionals are daily working with families in crisis under some of the most difficult, challenging and heartbreaking circumstances.  In the global south, they're often not well-paid, and have large case loads to manage.  They also travel long distances to reach families on their case loads that live in remote villages.  An African proverb states that "it takes a village to raise a child."  Social workers and case managers play a critical role as a part of that village, building the capacity that strengthens families and communities.