Buddying as a Transformative Tool in Intersectional Social Work: Innovation in Student Training and Support of At-Risk Children

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F61988987%3A17200%2F25%3AA2603C9M" target="_blank" >RIV/61988987:17200/25:A2603C9M - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://socialniprace.cz/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/SP42025-web-2.pdf" target="_blank" >https://socialniprace.cz/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/SP42025-web-2.pdf</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Buddying as a Transformative Tool in Intersectional Social Work: Innovation in Student Training and Support of At-Risk Children

Original language description

OBJECTIVES: Article explores how student-led buddying can function as a transformative tool in intersectional social work education and practice. It focuses on supporting children at risk of social exclusion and fostering students’ reflective and ethical development. THEORETICAL BASE: Article is grounded in international and Czech conceptualisations of buddying as a structured, supportive, peer relationship as transformative learning theory, as a process of changing frames of reference through experience. It also frames the intervention within the context of structural child poverty and exclusion in the Czech Republic, includes intersectionality as a lens to understand multiple, overlapping disadvantages. METHODS: The study is based on a qualitative analysis of interviews with students and practitioners engaged in a pilot buddying programme. While children’s lived experiences were accessed indirectly, the data reflect students’ perceptions of children’s intersecting disadvantages and their professional engagement with these realities. OUTCOMES: Buddying offers dual benefits: relational and emotional support for children, and a reflective, experience-based learning environment for students. Journaling and supervision were identified as key tools in navigating power dynamics, systemic barriers, and students’ own professional identities. SOCIAL WORK IMPLICATIONS: The findings support integrating buddying and reflective tools into social work education, and call for institutional shifts toward more collaborative, ethically grounded, and equity-focused social work practice.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_SC - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the SCOPUS database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

50403 - Social topics (Women´s and gender studies; Social issues; Family studies; Social work)

Project

<a href="/en/project/TQ03000519" target="_blank" >TQ03000519: BuddyUP! Supporting the inclusion of vulnerable children living in segregated environments</a><br>

Continuities

P - Projekt vyzkumu a vyvoje financovany z verejnych zdroju (s odkazem do CEP)

Publication year

2025

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Sociální práce

ISSN

1213-6204

e-ISSN

1805-885X

Volume of the periodical

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Issue of the periodical within the volume

4

Country of publishing house

CZ - CZECH REPUBLIC

Number of pages

16

Pages from-to

16-31

UT code for WoS article

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EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-105019257672