Training the Professional Worker

Abstract

Following the 1983 JNC resolution that unqualified workers will not be employed in full-time posts in the Youth and Community Service except as trainees questions about training have attained new significance. Further, a teaching qualification will not constitute an automatic entry route into the occupation after 1988. As a result a Service where, at the moment, only 27 per cent of full-time staff have received specialised training (Kuper, 1985, p. 15), will apparently be moving to a situation where all new recruits will be trained. Consequently initial training is in the process of becoming a prime agency for the socialisation of youth workers and, therefore, also a crucial influence upon the future quality and direction of the Youth Service. It is in this context that we look at the influences and policies that have shaped the form and content of initial training.