EDITORIAL

Editorial

Sulina Green

Department of Social Work, Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa. sgreen@sun.ac.za

The current issue of Social Work/Maatskaplike Werk presents research findings on the work-related concerns and occupational demands experienced by social service providers in service delivery and by social work educators.

The first article describes the coping strategies employed by social workers who have been subjected to service-user violence during social service delivery and puts forward suggestions for ensuring social workers' personal safety.

The common theme of the next two articles is the difficulties related to service delivery in the field of substance abuse. One article explores the synergy between government and business entities in the fight against substance abuse, and emphasises the need for government to adopt proactive methods of mobilising the business community to assist in the campaign against substance abuse. The other article deals with challenges facing social workers in their day-today activities when working with nyaope substance users as clients within the Community-Oriented Substance Use Programme (COSUP) and makes recommendations for providing quality care to service users and support to practitioners.

The focus of the next article is on how service providers have to deal with challenges in social service delivery to the youth. The article shows how a school-based group work intervention programme, utilising social learning theory, can be effective in improving the psychosocial functioning of adolescents exposed to domestic violence.

This is followed by three articles that cover work-related tensions in service delivery to young people in residential care. The first article offers practical solutions for addressing challenges that cause strain and compromise social workers' core role in Child and Youth Care Centres. The second article investigates the relationship between supervision and the psychosocial wellbeing of child and youth care workers, and concludes that supervision provides emotional support to deal with the causes of personal and job-related stress. The third article describes social support interventions available to young people who are leaving Child and Youth Care Centres and recommends policy changes and strengthening of social support interventions to alleviate their stress at leaving residential care.

The final article in this issue analyses pedagogical dilemmas which arise from the social work educators' task: namely, being responsible for teaching and learning and at the same time being obliged to respond to the psychosocial needs of students. The article presents guidelines to resolve these dilemmas.