RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE STUDY AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

This study offers several important suggestions from an international perspective that can expand national reform discussions. In addition, the findings have the potential to stimulate structural changes and include implications for SSW practice, education, research and its scientific development.

First, sub-study 1 reveals a great diversity of terms and concepts within German SSW. To further professionalise SSW and to enable international communication, the unification of terms and concepts is indispensable. The

diversity is predominantly traced back to a lack of a clear legal foundation;

therefore, it is recommended to introduce a dedicated section for SSW in the SGB VIII⁴⁰. Here, Finland might function as a role model for Germany.

Second, sub-study 3 shows that the provision of nutrition in each country is handled differently: while Finland provides its children proactively with free school meals, Germany provides means-tested benefits for those who are in need of support. As a consequence, the German professionals applied different roles in practice and were forced to develop several ideas, including unprofessional ones, in order to provide a child with adequate nutrition in schools. It is, therefore, recommended to introduce free school meals for all children as a basic service and means-tested benefits for those who need support to a greater extent in Germany. Free school lunches can thereby provide social security without the risk of stigmatisation. In addition, the introduction of additional means-tested benefits might be a useful addition in Finnish schools as it was shown that solely because children are provided with free school meals does not automatically mean that they are adequately provided with food during the week. Here, both countries might function as mutual role models, considering that both ways of processing problems have emerged in each country-specific context.

Third, sub-study 4 shows that the Finnish school social workers claim about their great workload associated with insufficient time and personnel resources. In addition, all participating school social workers work at several schools and are responsible for a huge number of pupils. Also, pandemics such as COVID-19 might lead to the intensification of already problematic situations (Schmitt, 2020). It is recommended to reduce the number of schools and pupils per school social worker and to closely follow the guidelines developed by Talentia (2016) to allow communal work to a greater extent.

The recommendations for SSW practice include the improvement of cooperative structures and relationships between all persons involved in

40 In June 2021, shortly before this manuscript went to print, school social work in Germany was enshrined in the German SGB VIII; it includes “socio-educational offers according to this section, which are made available to young people at the school”;

nevertheless, it is clarified that “details about the content and scope of the tasks of school social work are regulated by state law” (SGB VIII, Section 13a, subsection 3;

this researcher’s translation).

child protection in schools to guarantee timely reactions by, and accessibility of professionals in cases of child maltreatment as sub-study 4 showed that the cooperation and procedure processes can be improved. In addition, it is recommended to develop an appropriate balance between processing individuals’ own areas of responsibility and coordinating tasks with school personnel to provide children a holistic service. Also, as SSW links clients with systems and acts in the role of a liaison, the professionals need to be aware of services in the school and the community that can provide their clients with the necessary resources; therefore, they require networking skills. Thus, specifically in times of ongoing social transformation, there is an increased need for interdisciplinary cooperation and improved networking (Pohjola, 2016, pp. 94–95, as cited in Laitinen, M. et al., 2018, pp. 23–24).

The recommendations for SSW education include the mediation and practice of self-reflecting competencies and support of social work students in developing a professional balance between closeness and distance. This recommendation is derived from sub-studies 3 and 4, which reveals that there exist, besides striking professional knowledge concerning formal professional procedures in child maltreatment cases, difficulties in dealing with the emotional aspects of the work. Consequently, partly unprofessional ideas were developed by the German participants to provide children with nutrition.

Also, it is highly recommended to provide social work students with sufficient room to deal with the ethical principles developed by the IASSW and IFSW as sub-study 3 showed that almost no participant understood that they have a professional mandate to avoid or reduce children’s exposure to violent environments; this is a surprising result considering that all aspects of a client’s life must be recognised (IFSW, 2018). It is recommended to introduce advanced training courses for social work students to help them identify neglected children early and to sensitise them regarding all forms of child maltreatment.

Recommendations for SSW research include conducting cross-national comparative studies based on the model that emerged of the interrelated nature of SSW. Furthermore, it appears interesting to expand this study to another country that has a liberal welfare regime. There is a need for

cross-national comparative research in SSW that takes practice-related aspects of SSW and countries from Africa and South America into account as this study showed that comparative studies are primarily focused on social-political and profession-related aspects in European, Asian and North American countries, as well as Australia and New Zealand.

In addition, it is recommended that work-related stressors associated with the assessment of children’s well-being are investigated with a larger group of school social workers, and a potential shared understanding of child maltreatment and professional views despite different country-specific contexts.