Social work education and training consultations

We regulate all social work education and training courses in England to give the public confidence that students and apprentices who complete a social work course can meet our professional standards and are ready to practise safely and effectively.

We recently consulted on:

• revised education and training standards and guidance

• new readiness for professional practice guidance

• amendments to our education and training rules

These consultations closed on Thursday 6 August at 5pm. We are currently analysing the responses to this consultation. We will then publish responses and any amendments on our website.

1. Revised education and training standards and guidance

We are proposing updates to the education and training standards 2021 and streamlining the associated pieces of guidance. We approve qualifying social work courses against the standards. We are proposing these changes as we think they will improve the quality and consistency of social work education and training courses.

Read the consultation

2. Readiness for professional practice guidance

This a new piece of guidance that explains to course providers how to integrate the knowledge, skills and behaviours (KSBs) into their courses. The KSBs set out the outcomes that we expect students and apprentices to achieve from their courses so they can meet the professional standards. We have previously consulted on and published the KSBs, so they are not part of this consultation. However, we have refreshed the structure of the KSBs. This is to:

• enable integration of the KSBs into course curriculum

• provide students a clear framework of the KSBs they should be learning and where they should be learning them

• provide course providers with an assessment framework to ensure students are progressing through the required KSBs

• ensure a more streamlined approach to align with post qualifying frameworks, such as the Early Career Development Programme

It is our intention that proposed changes to the education and training standards will bring the KSBs into our regulatory framework. Subject to the outcome of this consultation, we propose that course providers would be required to demonstrate how they have mapped their courses to the KSBs and how they are monitoring student progression towards meeting the KSBs.

Read the consultation

3. Revised education and training rules

The rules set out our responsibilities and how we will regulate social work education and training courses. We have revised these to provide clarity for course providers and reflect learning from our first reapproval cycle.

Read the consultation

This image shows the framework that underpins the regulation, quality and consistency of all qualifying social work education and training courses across England.

The 3 parts of the framework are:

• the education and training standards and guidance

• the knowledge, skills and behaviours

• readiness for professional practice guidance

It enables course providers to ensure students and apprentices are capable and able to meet the professional standards when they apply to join the social work register.

View the accessible version of the education framework image.

Professional standards

Education and training standards

We approve pre-qualifying social work courses against these. The guidance provides information on what we expect courses to demonstrate and supports course providers in evidencing how they meet the standards.

Knowledge, skills and behaviours (KSBs)

The KSBs are mapped to our professional standards and set out the required knowledge, skills and behaviours all students and apprentices need to be able to demonstrate before completing their course. We expect course providers to map their curriculum to the KSBs.

Readiness for professional practice

This guidance helps course providers integrate the KSBs into their curriculum and sets out our expectations on how and where students are assessed against their development of the KSBs.