REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON PROFESSIONAL AND PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT

Reflective essay on professional and personal development

Reflective essay on professional and personal development

Introduction

This essay will summarise the case of a youth offender who has recently been released from Vinney Green (VG) Secure Unit in Bristol. The essay will include an in-depth analysis of intensive fostering care programmes, whilst taking into consideration the role of a social worker in the lives of youth offenders. Furthermore, my personal development throughout this module and arising from various classroom-based activities will be discussed.

This unit will not only display learning for the writer of the assignment but the readers will also develop a consensus. This unit helps young people to change their problematic behaviour to enable them to become responsible members of the community. A comprehensive case study and its analysis will help the young ones relate the incident to their personnel lives and form relating stories for themselves.

Discussion

Case Study

X is a 13-year-old boy from south-east London. He lived at VG for 12weeks, after being sentenced for drug dealing by criminal court under the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008.Drug dealing is an offence under sections 4 and 5 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.Two of X's elder brothers are in jail for the same crime. Therefore, a young person's family and close friends have a major influence on their personality; (Bronfenbrenner, 1979) describes them as part of a micro-system of a social ecological model for an individual. Initially the child merely observes and memorises behaviour, but at a later stage starts to imitate the acts and attitudes he witnesses.

At the young age of 13, X must have faced some confusion about his identity and his role in the society (Gross, 1987). His identity crisis is visible from the fact that he has a family background who is active participants of illegal activities but these members are praised by the family as they are bread earners for the family while the rest of the society discriminates him for being part of a family who takes part in illegal activities. This identity crisis is part of the growing phase for adolescent youth. Eventually, their own past experiences and the expectations of others play a major role in developing a sense of direction in the young person.

At VG, the carers involved X in a number of healthy and productive activities. He was taught different subjects on a daily basis and received training to become a car mechanic. Although the carers of VG were ensuring that he should spend his rest of the life as a legal and responsible citizen of the country, his mother had other plans because she was not ready to accept a member who was disgrace for a family socially. Eight days before his release, his mother refused to allow him to live at home again, so social services were asked to look for alternative accommodation. X was put in foster care but two weeks later he ran away; he was found by police and ...