Recent research, together with Reviews, Inquiries and Royal Commissions into child protection systems in Australia and internationally, have brought attention to the complexities and deficiencies in recordkeeping in such contexts. They have highlighted the implications of poorly captured and processed reports of child abuse and neglect, the challenges to better governance of children’s data and the necessity of child-centred and participatory recording and recordkeeping practices (Eberhard, 2015; Evans, Golding, O’Neill & Tropea, 2020; Evans, McKemmish, & Rolan, 2019; Nyland, 2016; Reed, Oliver, Upward and Evans, 2018; Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, 2017). However, while the outcomes for children and young people of poor practice in case recording are increasingly apparent, the challenges of quality child-centred case recording among child protection practitioners remain opaque, and the potential for systems shift through meaningful interdisciplinary collaboration between recordkeeping informatics and social work practice remains untested.
Built on collaboration and advocacy between recordkeeping professionals and social work, this presentation describes collaborative, interdisciplinary pilot research into both case recording experiences of social work practitioners in child protection systems and how recordkeeping is represented in current social work curriculum. This study delivers information about the structural, cultural and systemic challenges to rights-based recordkeeping in current child protection frameworks, processes and systems. This research also provides an opportunity to demonstrate to the social work community the value of advocating for a recordkeeping informatics perspective in addressing this complex problem (Reed, Oliver, Upward & Evans, 2018).
In this presentation, we will discuss the preliminary findings of our collaborative research together with the transformation and advocacy work that could be achieved through interdisciplinary collaborations between Social Work and Records Continuum researchers in imagining future potentialities and possibilities for enhancing recordkeeping practice focused on meeting a child’s current care and the lifelong identity, memory and accountability rights of Care experienced children, young people and adults.
References
Eberhard, K. (2015). Unresolved issues: recordkeeping recommendations arising from Australian commissions of inquiry into the welfare of children in out-of-home care, 1997–2012. Archives and Manuscripts, 43(1), 4-17.
Evans, J., Golding, F., O’Neill, C., & Tropea, R. (2020). “All I want to know is who I am”: Archival justice for Australian care leavers. In Archives, Recordkeeping, and Social Justice (pp. 105-126). Routledge
Evans, J., McKemmish, S., & Rolan, G. (2019). Participatory information governance: transforming recordkeeping for childhood out-of-home care. Records Management Journal
Nyland, M. (2016). The life they deserve: Child protection systems Royal Commission Report (0994269323). Government of South Australia, Adelaide. https://www.agd.sa.gov.au/sites/default/files/preface_summary_and_recommendations.pdf?v=1491456705
Reed, B., Oliver, G., Upward, F., & Evans, J. (2018). Multiple rights in records: the role of recordkeeping informatics. In Archival futures (pp. 99-116). Facet Publishing.
Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. (2017). Final Report: Volume 8
Recordkeeping and information sharing (Vol. 8). Attorney-General’s Department, Australian Government. https://www.childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au/recordkeeping-and-information-sharing