How I did it:

• I did a LOT of reading up on Social Work before hand.
• I did lots of volunteering to gain experience working with different people, eg. children, people with disabilities, elderly people etc.
• I wrote a personal statement for UCAS which briefly explained why I wanted to do the course and talked quite a bit about the experience I already had, and what I had learnt from each placement.
• I re-wrote this personal statement MANY times!!
• I spent TONNES of hours preparing for each interview. I read several books on Social Work and picked a current issue to read up on to make sure I talked about.
• I went into the interviews with great confidence, made sure I answered each question properly, and addressed my answer to the person on the panel who had asked it.

Lessons & tips:

• Make sure you do lots of voluntary work in several areas.
• Go to the library and find lots of books.
• Use the internet and follow link to link.
• Allow plenty of prep time.
• When doing your personal statement, get as many people as possible to read through it and tell you what they get as an impression of you from it.

Resources:

• http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Home/ - And then there will be plenty of links to just about everything from there!!
• http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tol_gug/gooduniversityguide.php - This site is great for choosing which uni's you want to go as apparently employers use this league table to see whether you went to a good uni!

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Oct 11, 2009, 12:28PM PDT | 0 comments | 2 cheers