| The Centre of Expertise
on Social
Welfare in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area Socca, the Centre of Expertise on Social Welfare in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, and the Heikki Waris Institute joined forces at the beginning of 2009. Socca was adopted as the name of the newly-consolidated unit. More information on Heikki Waris Institute> Socca develops customer work by means of practical research and strives to bring together the development networks of the municipalities, educational institutes and organisations in the metropolitan area. Focusing on practice research and development of practical education The new centre of expertise places great emphasis on collaboration with municipalities, the Uni-versity of Helsinki, universities of applied sciences and various organisations. One of the most es-sential points is to strengthen practice research in the social sector and develop practical education. Close co-operation with on-the-job professionals Work practices in the social sector are developed through practice research in collaboration with customer work professionals. Important partners in this effort include researching social workers, special social workers, developer socionoms (BSocSc) and other developers. The network co-operation is constantly strengthened and its results are presented to all parties involved. Universities of applied sciences to complement universities Similarly to our tight collaboration with universities, we are currently strengthening our ties with universities of applied sciences. Our partner network includes the University of Helsinki's Depart-ment of Social Policy and Department of Applied Sciences of Education as well as the following universities of applied sciences: Metropolia, Diak and Laurea. The co-operation produces, for ex-ample, theses and practical teaching clinics. We also engage in collaborative work with various organisations in the social sector. A wide variety of developmental focuses Socca and the Heikki Waris Institute have a long history in the development of child welfare and early education. We have also concentrated our efforts on areas such as homelessness and gam-bling addiction. Some of our more recent areas of focus include immigrant work and welfare re-search in the metropolitan area. Financing and administration Socca's operations are funded by the state, the municipalities of the metropolitan area, the Univer-sity of Helsinki and the Helsinki Metropolia University of Applied Sciences. Administratively Socca is a part of the City of Helsinki's Social Services Department. Contact information Director Pirjo Marjamäki tel. +358 40 334 6401 pirjo.marjamaki(at)hel.fi Tel +358 9 310 61722 socca@hel.fi www.socca.fi Postal Address: P.O. Box 7409 00099 City of Helsinki Finland Street Address: Käenkuja 3 aB -1st floor 00500 Helsinki Finland
Aulikki Kananoja, Social Director (emerita) Helsinki :The
Dialogue of Social Work and Practice and Research The Heikki Waris
Institute as a model of Collaboration, August 2009 Aulikki Kananoja, Social Director (emerita) Helsinki: |