Large-Scale Policy Changes on Human Services Practice

Large-scale policy changes on human services practice and education holds massive significance on the daily operations of such services, as well as on the broader scale provision of such services within a given community. In understanding and analyzing the basic significance of such policy changes, as well as in understanding the key factors that contribute to these changes, one can better understand the extensive nature of the process, as policy changes not only take time to formulate and implement, but maintain significant impact on the affected area for time to come as the group affected learns to act under these new policy provisions.

As the primary purpose of the human service worker is to assist individuals and communities to function as effectively as possible in the major domains of living, a policy change as simple as increased continued education for human service workers working in child care centers holds significant implications within that employee's field including impact on the worker, the place of employment and the children with whom the human service worker interacts with within his or her employment landscape on a daily basis.

Analysis of Significance, Contributing Factors and Future Development

In order to better understand the significance that a change in social policy regarding service practice and education can have within the field of human services, one must first understand the basis of a social policy. Social policy is largely the result of public policy decisions made by government officials in their continual but not always successful attempts to ensure the safety and well-being of citizens (McKenzie and Wharf, 2010, p. 10). The same basis for policy change can be viewed in understanding large-scale policy changes on human services practice and education. In attempting to better the field, and in conjunction, better field workers, the government has the ability to employ policy changes such as increases in the minimum amount of continued education required within the field of human services in order to continue working within that field. In understanding this notion in respect to the example of minimum educational requirements being increased in order for human service workers to maintain employment in venues such as child care centers, such educational requirements have the capacity to drastically alter the landscape and environment of the job in many different ways.

For instance, a person's standpoint has the ability to change through ongoing activity, as activity brings about new ways of thinking that may alter the way an individual thought about something previously or how they act in certain situations. In undergoing new education under policy-change initiatives, a human service worker, regardless of past experiences or daily work in their respective areas of employment, has the newfound ability to change the way they think and act based on newly-imparted knowledge. However, in understanding that the government has the capacity to regulate certain policies and make changes without utilizing the expertise of individuals who actually work within the field, the question of how beneficial such policy changes, such as the one at hand, really are comes immediately into play.

Child care workers, for instance, operate under the general understanding that policies are implemented on a generally-subjective level from worker to worker, with each individual understanding the basis of these policy requirements and acting in accordance with these respective policies in many different ways. Such a reality can be based on the fact that in implementing initial policy decisions or in altering existing policies, the government rarely if ever asks human service workers to consult during the policy development cycle, and often their expertise is not fully taken into account.

While the government introduces such policy without true adherence to the inner-workings of the field, practitioners are largely confined to a domain which involves service delivery in compliance with new policies and standards regardless of the government's inability to fully understand all the implications and effects that such policy changes bring about (McKenzie and Wharf, 2010, p. 13). As human service workers with high degrees of specialization, which comes from such continued education as per the example at hand, are increasingly expected to coordinate a range of services for users, human service professionals are not always regarded as the people who should be filing complaints which adds additional backlash to the implementation of policy decisions still in their phasing-out stages, and especially under the notion that the government finances much of the field's existence (McKenzie and Wharf, 2010, p.53).

In such instances, superiors in employment areas are placed in a position of being the "whistle-blower" in situations in which direct compliance from workers is not adhered to. Managers and supervisors are often put in the position of scrutinizing workers closely, exerting more control over their work processes and taking disciplinary actions against workers who deviate from benchmarks and best practices (Baines, 2007, p.10). In circumstances such as these, the good work that is being performed by human services workers is overshadowed by the nit-picking that certain policy changes bring about allowing service workers to feel oppressed, and one is more apt to ask if such minor initiatives actually benefit the field in the full manner in which government bureaucrats intended.