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Research on Social Work Practice, Vol. 16, No. 4, 392-405 (2006)
DOI: 10.1177/1049731505279292
© 2006 SAGE Publications

Do Social Workers Make Better Child Welfare Workers Than Non–Social Workers?

Robin E. Perry

Florida State University

Objective: To empirically examine whether the educational background of child welfare workers in Florida impacts on performance evaluations of their work. Method: A proportionate, stratified random sample of supervisor and peer evaluations of child protective investigators and child protective service workers is conducted. ANOVA procedures are used to test if performance scores on a multitude of items differ for workers with university degrees in social work, psychology, sociology, criminology, education, business, and other fields. Results: The ratings of social workers' skills and competency do not statistically differ from those workers with other educational backgrounds on 20 measures of performance. Conclusion: Findings suggest that the educational background of child welfare workers is a poor predictive variable of their performance as evaluated by supervisors and peers. However, more research is needed to determine if performance evaluations of workers are positively correlated with successful service outcomes with clients.

Key Words: child welfare workers • child welfare services • performance evaluation • social workers • professional comparisons


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