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Practice placements are a core part of qualifying as a social worker. Students must spend at least 200 days in practice over their course. Up to 30 of these days can be allocated to students developing their skills for practice; these are also known as 'skills days'. Placements are where students become practice‑ready to meet professional standards, as they allow students to gain experience in contrasting practice settings. Good placements help ensure social work students enter the workforce confident and capable.
During their first year in employment, newly qualified social workers are supported to build on their knowledge and skills in order to undertake a range of activities expected of a qualified social worker, including safeguarding activities, showing that they can responsibly undertake appropriate decision‑making within the settings where they work, and ensure that their practice is strengths‑based.
Employers tell us they highly value placement students and often recruit directly from their placement pipeline, because placements allow students to build confidence, understand organisational culture, and work with people who draw on care and support in complex, real‑life situations.
At the same time, securing enough high‑quality placements is becoming increasingly challenging. Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) report difficulties in finding suitable practice learning opportunities, particularly statutory placements, with pressures including limited practice educator capacity, travel barriers for students, and stretched local authority teams. From the student perspective, placements also come with real financial and practical challenges. Placement requirements limit students’ ability to take on paid work, while travel and subsistence costs can be substantial, particularly in rural areas or where placements are far from home. This means that placements are not just a learning issue, but an access and equality issue too.
The Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) funds the Social Work Bursary, which provides placement travel allowance, as well as the Education Support Grant (ESG), which exists to support practice‑based learning by contributing to the costs of arranging and delivering placements. This includes funding for placement providers, HEIs, skills development days, and involvement of people who draw on support and carers in education. The aim is to support high‑quality placements so that students can learn about the many ways in which social work practice supports the lives of people within the communities in which we live. Many HEIs choose to invest additional funding alongside the ESG in their work to involve people with lived experience, reflecting how vital their contribution is in preparing students for social work practice.
Proposed changes to the Social Work Bursary and the Education Support Grant - consultation documentThrough the current consultation on the Social Work Bursary and the ESG, the DHSC is asking the profession to help us understand how the ESG is used and whether it is being targeted in the right way to support placements now and in the future. We know placements are highly valued, but we also know the system is under strain. The consultation is an opportunity to hear directly from people who draw on support, social workers, students, HEIs, employers and the wider sector about what is working, what is not, and how we can best support access to high-quality placements that lead to skilled practitioners.
We asked Professor Christine Cocker, Head of School of Social Work, Sociology and Education at the University of East Anglia for her views on some of the challenges:
Potential issues to consider are whether the travel to placement allowance should be changed to acknowledge that students in rural areas incur additional travel costs in attending placement, or whether we should keep to the existing system which offers all students a flat rate for travel costs. HEIs are aware that one of the core issues facing the downturn in traditional MA route student numbers is the amount of the bursary. Should this be changed by earmarking the MA route into social work with a higher bursary and limiting the bursary to the final year of the BA programme?
Most importantly, we should continue to promote social work as a rewarding career and support different routes into the profession and a diversity of people applying to become social workers. This is one of the strengths of the current offer to become a qualified social worker. Practice placements are a large part of ensuring that our initial qualifying education is robust in preparing students for practice. It also sets the culture of the profession as one that embraces learning and development at every opportunity. The organisations who employ social workers and offer placements are a part of ensuring the ongoing ability of the profession to develop to meet the needs of the people we serve.
DHSC wants to understand views from across the profession, including current and future students, HEIs, and employers on how the Social Work Bursary and the ESG can best support students within the resources available, ultimately helping them have long and rewarding careers in social work.
The consultation is open until 7 April 2026: Proposed changes to the Social Work Bursary and the Education Support Grant - consultation document - GOV.UK seen at 09:53, 20 March in Social work with adults.