Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE)

SCIE is an independent agency, sponsored by the English Department of Health and the National Assembly for Wales, providing a national focus for knowledge development in social work and social care. It has a staff of 35, is based in London UK, and includes research, practice development, and knowledge management teams.

SCIE has the task of developing a methodology to undertake systematic reviews of the knowledge base underpinning social work and social care, of commissioning reviews and practice surveys, of exploring ways of achieving policy and practice change, and of making knowledge widely accessible, mainly through our organisational website (www.scie.org.uk) and through the Electronic Library for Social Care (www.elsc.org.uk).

Work to date has included methodological reports on the Types and Quality of Knowledge in Social Care, reviews of private fostering, adoption, the learning and teaching of assessment and of communication in qualifying social work education, outcomes in foster care, user involvement in social care, and research utilization in the social care workforce. Development work is also underway on a resource guide for learning organizations, user involvement in social work education, the principles of effective practice in fostering, web-based learning modules for research literacy, access to web-based resources for people with learning difficulties, and on user and carer involvement in the governance of social care.

Work on participation, services to children and families, social work education, human resource management, services to adults and the use of knowledge in social care will be the core themes of future work in SCIE.

Contact:
Professor Mike Fisher
Director of Research and Reviews
mike.fisher@scie.org.uk