PART 2B – Group Report (30%)
Due Date: Sunday of Week 10
Word Count: 800 words per student contribution (+ or – 10%); as an indication/example, the total word count for a 4-person group* would be 3200 words (+ or – 10%) excluding references. Note: word count is an academic discipline and is assessable. Do not go below or exceed the word limit past 10%.
The group must complete a written report on your chosen case study, following the work you completed in the oral presentation.
Structuring the Report
While an oral presentation with power point slides is necessarily brief, sufficient only to capture the critical aspects of the case, in the Report you must expand on these. You cannot use bullet points in the Report as you would do in the slides; instead, the Report must be written in full, following the report writing conventions for academic work.
The Report must therefore follow the correct structure and organisation of text including:
• Cover page – all student names and ID numbers
• Title page: case study number and title
• Introduction
• A number of paragraphs constituting the ‘body’ of the assignment in which you conduct your analysis and discussion as per instructions above. NOTE: please do not call this ‘body’! Instead organise your paragraphs using sub-headings to group the content of your assignment in a coherent way
• Conclusion
• Reflection: each student must include their individual reflection, which will be marked on merit per student, not per group
• List of references: this must combine the references from all students which will be collated into a single list, following the APA7 referencing style
• Minutes of your meetings: brief but informative to clearly show who did what in the assignment.
A note on sub-headings: For each section noted above, please use sub-headings to flag to the reader where you are at; for example, Introduction and Conclusion are two such sub-headings. Other examples of sub-headings in the body of the assignment might be ‘Implications for the client’ or ‘Ethical DecisionMaking Model (include the name of the model used), or Ethical Principles. What you use for sub-headings is up to you, but they need to reflect your analysis, concepts you use, etc.
Content of the Report
1. Briefly outline the facts of the case- do not reproduce/re-write the case study in your report, but state the question title and number at the start of your report, and give a brief overview
2. Identify and analyse the relevant ethical issues, explaining the tensions that arise from the case for a community worker in Australia (e.g. conflict of interest, suspected child abuse, requests by client that cannot be accommodated, etc.)
3. Apply the relevant ethical principles and concepts (eg. self-determination/autonomy, privacy/confidentiality, social justice, dual roles, etc. as applicable) to the case, drawing out their significance
4. If/where relevant, cite appropriate legislation – if it is state-specific, ensure you cite the legislation pertinent to the Australian state for the campus you are in
5. Name and explain a decision-making model and outline a clear ethical decision-making process
6. Discuss the benefits and potential harms or drawbacks of the decision or actions the case worker could/would take
7. For the Reflection, consider briefly on your own role in the process of preparing Assignment 2:
preparing and delivering the oral presentation, the process of working as a group, and what you believe to have learned about ethics in community services through this process
8. Include the full list of references at the end
9. Copy and paste the Minutes for your meetings (see separate document with instructions on how to prepare the Minutes)
10. It is crucial that only the Lead for Part B submits the written Report for Part B into Moodle. There must be no drafts or final versions submitted into Moodle by other members of the group.
Literature and Referencing
• Your written report should include 8 – 12 (combined) sources of literature, though this may vary slightly depending on topic. As a group, you must determine what is needed to support your discussion.
• All sources/references must be justified or shown to be relevant or significant to your discussion. Do not simply make a list of statements with references at the end of a sentence, without showing why/how the reference is relevant. Long lists of references that are not clearly shown to be relevant will not attract better marks!
• All the sources/literature must be legitimate and credible. Thus you should include a mix of scholarly (academic) peer reviewed journal articles and your text book chapters, as well as regulatory literature as relevant to your case study. Examples of regulatory literature are legislation (Federal and/or state/territory), policy (particularly government policy, federal or state/territory), codes of ethics/codes of conduct, etc. All of these can be found on the Internet, but ensure you locate the correct authoring organization/department and cite according to their suggestion.
• All regulatory documents must be Australian, and if you draw on state-specific regulation, it must be relevant to your state
• If you use international sources for peer reviewed journal articles (these are academic, research articles), you must show the relevance to the Australian context
• You must use APA 7 referencing. As an upper level (2nd year) unit for senior students, there can be no justification for not knowing how to use APA7 correctly, nor for any form of academic misconduct. Failure to abide by this by one member in the group will result in the entire group receiving the same penalty.
Do NOT utilise sources such as www.tutor2u.com and other such web materials as these in no way constitute academic references for the purpose of your assignments. If you rely on such sources for theoretical support, you will be deemed NOT to have met the requirements of the assessment.
Criteria Weighting 100%
Identification and explanation of ethical issues from the case study 20%
Identification and explanations of ethical and legal concepts pertinent to the case study 20%
Discussion of decision-making process, potential benefits and drawbacks of decisions by worker 20%
Use and depth of research, quality of references and referencing 15%
Evidence of effective group work and Minutes 10%
Individual mark: reflection on group work and learning about ethics in community work 15%
TOTAL /100%