Research Topics relevant to FSWS for 2015-2016
Human Resources Management
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What keeps employees in employment within the social sector?
Productivity tools needed – what really works – tools for empowerment?
Avoiding and coping with stress and burnout.
Philosophies in recruitment – the changing dynamics of talent acquisition.
Promoting change management.
KPI Key Performance Indicators – how and what really works in the social sector?
Internal communication within organisations – what hinders and what strategies
can be adopted to monitor, support, facilitate, and improve communication.
8. Performance Appraisals in a non-revenue environment with no monetary
rewards.
9. What motivates management to achieve targets in non-profit organizations?
10. Turnover of staff due to stress – incidence and ways of managing.
11. Staff motivation in the Social Welfare Sector.
12. Recruitment Process – evaluation of the Public vs Private sector
13. Techniques and skills required to assess and audit NGOs performance, both in
relation to operations and finance, with particular focus on those that receive
public funding.
Quality Assurance
1. Evaluation tools to be used for Social Services evaluations (Undergraduate
Degree level)
2. Audit tools for Social Welfare Services (Undergraduate Degree/Masters Level)
3. Operations Evaluation of Services that will be identified by
Management/Research Department (Masters Level)
4. Best use of Private Social Partnerships (Masters level)
5. Tools for improving vertical and horizontal communications for social services
institutions (Masters Level)
6. Organising effecting media campaigns and portraying a positive image of the
social welfare role (Undergraduate Degree level)
7. How are the Community Services helping within the Community? Do people
within the community know about the services and are they aware of what they
provide?
8. A gap-analysis of current services, especially vis-à-vis the needs of service users.
9. Quality Control in the Public Sector.
10. Cost Benefit Analysis:
a. To determine whether to introduce a new service, and/or;
b. To compare the cost-effectiveness of services in relation to one another.
EU Projects
1. How can organisations within the social sector get the most out of funds available
through the EU for their projects?
Sedqa
1. Holistic interventions with substance abusers with young children (i.e. the
involvement of families).
2. Counselling persons with technological addictions.
3. Gender perspectives in addictions, such as:
a. What obstacles do female service-users face when they need to access
services?
b. Why are services failing to attract female service-users?
c. What are the needs of female service-users with children and how do these
needs differ from those of mainstream service-users?
d. What are the success rates of female service users when compared to males?
e. What do services need to do to be more gender neutral?
f. What are the benefits, if any, of gender mainstreaming in addiction services?
g. Are current services managing to identify the victims of domestic violence
amongst service-users and are the services managing to address the needs
caused by such situations?
4. Effective prevention interventions within the area of substance misuse (including
using IT technology such as Applications for iPad and Androids).
5. The effectiveness of short interventions within the addictions field.
6. Changing trends amongst drug-users.
7. The effectiveness of probation and supervision orders in reducing recidivism
amongst drug-users.
8. A study of whether an Anglo-Saxon based drug-court model would be effective if
introduced in Malta.
9. The up-take and effectiveness of the Arrest Referral Scheme.
10. A study of the how the National Drug Policy (2008) has changed drug-services in
Malta.
11. A study on the possible benefits of the introduction of a pan-agency National Intake
Unit.
12. How effective are awareness campaigns in reducing drug and alcohol abuse and
other risky behaviours?
13. What is the association between drug/alcohol abuse and other risky behaviours?
14. Is the take-home-methadone programme effective in increasing the employability of
service-users?
15. Why are traditional/mainstream vocational training and courses ineffective for drugusers?
16. Is the screening and treatment of IV-drug-users effective in reducing Hepatitis and
HIV-related risk behaviours?
Appoġġ
1. The impact of domestic violence on families, including the psychological impact
on children witnessing violence.
2. The impact of domestic violence in childhood on adult relationships.
3. The experience of domestic violence on choice of future partners.
4. Why do victims of domestic violence stay in violent relationships?
5. Domestic Violence victims’ perspectives on their children’s safety and security.
6. The effect of trans-racial adoptions on children.
7. The effects of adoption on the adoptee as an adult.
8. The effect of adoption on adolescents.
9. The relationship between biological children and adopted children.
10. Gay couple adoptions – literature review.
11. Adopting an abused child – Guidelines for prospective adoptive parents –
(Literature review and recommendations)
12. The effects and impact of Interim Care Order proceedings on children.
13. The effects and impact of Interim Care Order proceedings on parents.
14. What children understand by abuse.
15. The emotional turmoil experienced by local CPS workers and its impact on the
personal and professional life of the individual.
16. The way foster carers are affected by the narratives of abuse they listen to and
how they deal with it.
17. How early abuse, rejection, chaotic parenting in early childhood is effecting teens
today and how can we deal with this instability in adolescence.
18. What constitutes better outcomes in foster care?
19. How are foster care families affected by a child’s trauma?
20. Contact with birth family for fostered children - essential or hindrance?
(Literature review and perspectives of different professionals – possibly more
than one student could undertake this study)
21. How do foster carers get to know about the foster care service – what are the
most effective means of awareness? How can these be improved?
22. The perceptions of the public on Supportline 179: What do they think we can do
or what are we there for, so that we can then improve the way that we get our
message across (a quantitative research conducted amongst the general public).
23. Why do people become volunteers and how can we keep their motivation high
over time?
24. What are the competencies which are crucial within specialised foster care
placements and how can these be developed - Literature review and interviews
with professionals involved in the field of out of home care.
25. What supervision strategies are effective with care providers - literature review.
26. What support services will enhance specialised placements.
27. Therapeutic parenting techniques which work in the Maltese context.
28. Alternative forms of care that meet the needs of difficult to place children and
young persons.
29. What criteria are to be used in arriving at decisions to refer children and young
persons to be adopted?
30. Recruitment of foster carers – What strategies work best?
31. Providing a therapeutic programme for children - what would be the essential
elements?
32. Principles of therapeutic communities which could be applied to the Maltese
context when caring for children.
33. Effects of long term SAVs on children- way forward for SAV.
34. Parental alienation.
35. How is the Cottonera Community Service helping within the Cottonera
Community? Do people within this community know about its service and are
they aware of what it provides?
36. How can effective outreach be implemented with young people to engage
them from young ages in different programmes?
37. Where do youngsters socialise in their free time and how can the community
teams reach out to several gangs?
38. Unemployment issues in Cottonera – What are the factors contributing towards
unemployment?
39. Poverty issues within Cottonera – What is missing?
40. What services are being offered in Zejtun and what is the level of awareness
about them? What are the real needs in this community and what services could
be offered?
41. The importance of the first years in children’s life and the impact that support in
the family has on the parents and children. Reference to be made as to how
homestart Malta is leaving an impact in Malta.
42. The effect on children who grow up under the care of grandparents implications.
43. The needs of carers who are looking after the elderly –implications.
44. The effects of cultural differences in upbringing.
45. Development of a service evaluation tool which can be used as part of the
services’ procedures (Masters or Ph.D. students only)
46. Evaluation Studies: (Masters or Ph.D. students only)
a. Child Protection Service and its effectiveness
b. Ghabex: An evaluation of the service to see if the shelter is meeting
society's needs
c. Intake and Family Support Service
d. Family Workshops
e. High Support Service
f. Perpetrator’s programme and support group
g. Youth-in-Focus: Considering the changes which YIF has had as a service in
the past years, it would be a helpful exercise if we can have an evaluation
of the work being done and any improvements that need to be made.
h. Mater Dei Hospital: Evaluating community services for the elderly: Are
they enough? Are they of a good level? How can they be improved so that
the elderly can live independently in their own home?
Sapport
1. Experience of living within a residential setting vs at home with family members,
adults and youth.
2. Relationships with staff and issue re boundaries, attachment (staff not a
replacement of family members). Could be taken from staff’s perspective as
well, such as for the community staff, difficulty of keeping boundaries when
working with clients in their homes.
3. Parents’ guilt/issues vis-a-vis not being able to take care of their children, which
results in the need of residential placement/respite.
4. Communication styles and alternative ways of communications.
5. Protection issues of adult persons with disability: what needs to be in place for
their protection?
6. A Maltese perspective of sexuality issues in relation to persons with disability.
7. Current situation in regards to inclusion of persons with disability at the
workplace: methods to enhance such inclusion.
8. Evaluating the different Services provided by Agenzija Sapport and assessing
whether the needs of the service users are being met adequately.
9. Staff motivation.
10. Emotional support to staff to prevent stress & burnout.
11. Implementation of Child Care Centres within FSWS & its Agencies
12. Different levels of autism.
13. Improving communication skills with non-verbal service users.
14. Challenging behaviour and how to deal with it.
15. Minimising self harm.
16. Leisure in Day Services/Residential Services.
17. What skills are important to know for persons with disability?
18. Self Identity for persons with disability.
19. What skills do care students need when working with persons with disability?
20. Organizing effective campaigns to involve society more.
21. Compiling an interactive Disability Awareness Programme within schools, with
input from teachers, parents and students.
22. How to support parents of persons with disability.
23. How can the parents-agency relationship be improved so as to have a
trustworthy relationship?
24. Increasing employability opportunities in the community.
25. Adapting schools and curriculum for persons with disability, in view of the
current situation regarding the inclusion in schools.
26. Ways of investing in staff working with persons with disability.
27. Service user involvement in our services.
28. What does ‘quality of life’ mean to our service users?
29. Perception of parents of children with disability on respite.
30. Standards of care in homes run by NGOs vs those run by the Agency.
31. How do service users’ experiences impact social workers/other professionals?
32. How acquired disabilities impact the family.
33. How degenerative disabilities impact service users and their families.
34. Client self determination in residences.
35. What knowledge and awareness do employees working in a specific setting (e.g.
banks) have on disability.
36. Breaking the news: Dealing with diagnoses at hospital settings. (What are their
expectations on the services).
37. Family awareness on disability services.
38. Accessible information to visually impaired and deaf service users, and the need
for it.
39. Community services: A comparison between government services and private
services.