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Limited research demonstrates that social workers have been using social media to gain another view of service-users’ lives through observing their Facebook pages. While it is known that such practices occur, no empirical research has shown how Facebook is actually used in casework with families and under what circumstances. This article uniquely fills this gap by drawing on an ethnographic study of child protection social work practice in England that involved 15 months of participant observation at two sites. Our findings show that the use of Facebook by social workers was commonplace in risk assessments and on-going casework and took two forms. Some social workers proactively initiated searches of service users’ Facebook sites, a practice prevalent in literature on the use of social media in social work. But we also found that some used Facebook because they were unwillingly ‘drawn into’ acting on information that was presented to them by others, an aspect of social media use that is not covered in the literature. Some social workers were clearly opposed to any usage. This article employs a framework of two opposing ethical positions to describe what we observed: Kantian, where such use was seen by practitioners as invasive of privacy and unethical; and Utilitarian, where it was justified as ethically defensible because it helped to keep children safe. Given our unique research insights, we argue that social work must pause to consider the ethical implications of these practices in depth, before they become even more institutionalised.

This paper reports on our use of a two-phased, feminist memory work in a project conducted with 11 women, social science students at an Australian university. We begin by describing government-led attempts to widen participation in Australian universities because 10 of the 11 women who participated in our project were from non-traditional backgrounds. We discuss qualitative group research, identifying some of the benefits and limitations of focus groups, before differentiating them from feminist memory work and analysing key findings. Using excerpts from participants' written stories and oral discussions, we analyse some of the obstacles the women faced trying to complete their studies. Our attention then turns to methodological concerns where we examine memory work as a feminist inquiry method. As second-wave feminists understood several decades ago through their use of consciousness-raising groups, we describe how we derived many benefits from using feminist memory work. The method invites deep reflection on the intersections between the personal and political and can be productive of insights about how people feel, not just think, about their experiences. A sense of solidarity can stem from this awareness amongst participants who have a chance to workshop and thus reinterpret their own stories and those of others, which can mean a growth in self-confidence and a reduction in self-blame. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

In this article, we report on a feminist memory work project conducted with 11 working-class women in Australia. Participants responded to the question: what helps and hinders working-class women study social science degrees? The women confirmed that to succeed at university, they needed opportunities, resources, support and encouragement. We called these enablers and considered the role of enlightened witnesses' [Miller, 1997. Theessential role of an enlightened witness in society. Retrieved from http://www.alice-miller.com/index_en.php?page=2]. Hindering the possibility of university success were detractors of many forms including inadequate resources and social conventions that discouraged the women from study. We describe saboteurs as undermining people and forces that the women had to overcome. We found that enlightened witnesses, broadly conceptualised, go some way but not all, to mitigating detractors and saboteurs that continue to hamper fair and meritocratic access to tertiary education. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

Some interventions by social workers, teachers and parents take time to develop but can produce, in the longer term, powerful and unexpectedly positive results. We were reminded of this in 2013, when we undertook a small qualitative study where we used feminist memory work to explore the experiences of 11 women from low socioeconomic backgrounds studying social sciences at an Australian university. Of the eleven participants, seven were from social work. When asked to remember their journey into tertiary education, the women revealed memorable encounters with social workers, teachers and parents, the impact of which had lasted well into the future. We use the gardening metaphor of 'planting a seed' to refer to interventions that may not blossom in the short term but can bear fruit months or years later. Yet, we also note that 'seeds of doubt' can be planted too. We conclude by suggesting that planting seeds of possibility is a worthy but potentially overlooked professional activity. Yet, since ours is a small study, further research is warranted to explore the influence of social workers who plant seeds of possibility and whose actions help to recruit and retain socially disadvantaged students in higher education. Refereed/Peer-reviewed