ISSN 1393-7022

Editorial

This volume of the Irish Journal of Applied Social Studies (4:2 Winter 2003) was some time in gestation for a number of reasons. Perhaps the main reasons I might cite are twofold: (1) We were awaiting the deliberations of a number of our sponsor partners to see if they were in a position to renew their corporate subscriptions. We live in an increasingly resource-strapped economy and understand that it is difficult to locate monies. However, this journal is now the premier journal in social care in Ireland and we would urge all sponsors to continue to support this publication. (2) Our peer reviewers had much work to do this time around as we received papers from New Zealand, Australia, Canada and Ireland, which had to go through an increasingly rigorous peer review process. We are pleased with this development as it ensures quality of work published.

Thorn Garfat discusses, in some detail, child and youth care practice as it is in North America - in constant evolution. He provides us with a review of the literature, conversations about practice and participation in the activities of the field which reveal certain treads or themes which reflect the state of the field at this particular point in time.

Perry Share's paper outlines a process of curriculum development in the applied social studies programme at the Institute of Technology, Sligo (ITS) in the north west of Ireland over the period 1998-2004. It describes the context within which the programme has developed; explores facets of educational change and academic leadership; outlines the key learning outcomes and strategies of the programme; delineates the theoretical bases for the changes made and proposed; and reviews the implementation of the revised programme. Although Perry has a very significant publication record, this is his first paper in IJASS and we hope the first of many!

Varda Mann-Feder from Montreal discusses the termination phase of residential child care placement noting that it has a very powerful effect on post-placement adjustment. Her article reviews relevant literature from a range of helping/caring professions and outlines implications for managing termination with children and youth in care. Major themes are: termination elicits ambivalence and can manifest as behavioural regression; intervention during the termination phase can have significant impact; and the capacity of child and youth care workers to deal with separation issues must be considered. This is also Varda's first paper in IJASS and we hope she will continue to write for us in the future.

Brody Cameron, the marketing executive of the journal, has completed a review for us, which is very helpful in locating articles from the past. He notes that we have now published over sixty papers from across the world and that the journal is growing in popularity. For the benefit of social care students, he provides an index of paper titles and authorship.

Niall McElwee and Dave Parslow share a paper on men as role models in residential child care. Our paper is written partly as a response to the two papers by Mark Smith (2003) and Mike Bums (2003) published in the last volume of the Relational Journal of Child and Youth Care. Our aim is to maintain and add to the debate around `maleness' and `masculinity' in child and youth care. Specifically, we are interested in men as potential positive role models to children and youth in our care. We provide some biographical details in order to context this debate in what Thom Garfat has termed the `relational male discourse'.