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4 AUGUST 2010

NO 1611

Admissions planning

The dramas surrounding the admission process are played out up and down the country a hundred times each day. There must be as many ways of regulating admissions to residential homes and schools as there are local authorities. Different criteria are used by establishments in the voluntary and private sector. Some heads of homes and residential schools have autonomy in respect of admissions. Others have no control over the composition of the resident group.

Difficulties may also arise when communication channels are unclear, for example, in agencies where admissions are handled by a central placements section physically and emotionally removed from the problems being encountered by the practitioner; during the annual leave or sick leave of a homes manager, or at weekends; or whenever field workers or area officers attempt to bypass the homes manager and arrange a hasty admission. It is not unknown for games to be played, and the extent of a resident’s disturbed behaviour or the seriousness of his or her delinquency may not always be fully revealed until after admission.

With increasing pressure on places, with local authorities intent on minimising unit costs, and voluntary and private homes also having to keep their residential establishments as near full as possible, the coming year will see another round of interesting duels fought between heads of homes and their external managers, between heads of homes and various members of staff and between fieldworkers and their team leaders or area officers. In their different ways they will be hoping to provide the best possible placements for their clients, bearing in mind the multiplicity of factors deriving from individual perspectives: as a manager of scarce resources; as a head of home matching the needs of the individual with the needs of the group; as a fieldworker concerned with an ‘ overall plan for a client and his or her family; or as a residential social worker preoccupied with the problems of day to day living and the management of the group.

Many establishments do feel supported by their homes managers. Most negotiations ‘ move to a natural conclusion – over the ‘ telephone, through correspondence or occasionally face to face – and usually the outcome will prove as satisfactory as possible for all concerned: client, fieldworker, head of home, residential workers and area officer. Sometimes a protective homes manager will perform the ritual dance with a senior colleague within the hierarchy of the department before approaching a head of home. We must remember that homes managers, too, have their problems.

Other negotiations, however, will be protracted, sometimes badly conducted, steeped in ill feeling and result in a decision to admit a client to an establishment considered by those who will be working more closely with the resident-to-be unlikely to meet his or her needs. This does not augur well for the future, but underlines the fact that there are some clients nobody wants as residents, and some residents not catered for within our current provision.

On the one hand, there is now a thrust towards encouraging each home to set out its aims, objectives and admission criteria within the framework of departmental policy. On the other, heads of homes are too often expected to pack in unsuitably placed residents. Little wonder that tensions arise between residential staff and their external managers, the former being more concemed about the quality of care in their homes and less with maximising the number of bodies in beds. In cases of conflict the decision to admit a certain client to a particular establishment is ultimately made by the individual operating from the strongest power base.

Receiving people in residential establishments with the care that the occasion demands is one of the most important tasks social workers are called upon to perform. If the arrival has been preceded by dispute, if the resident is viewed by the staff as an additional burden, signals will be transmitted that he or she is unwelcome.

The admission of a person to a residential setting, especially in the case of an unexpected as opposed to a planned admission, is always a crisis for the individual. lt is easy to lose sight of this as we get caught up in complex power struggles in history, personality, status or hierarchy. President Kaunda of Zambia once suggested that the "Inability of those in power to still the voices of their own consciences is the great force leading to desired change." If they believe in change, it is always wise for managers to hear the voices of experienced practitioners. This question of conscience may not then arise.

LEONARD DAVIS

Davis, L. (1982). The importance of planning admissions. In Payne, C. and White, K. The Best of In Residence, Vol. 2. London. Social Work Today/The Residential Care Association. pp. 114-115.

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