Collaborative Outcomes Learning Tool (COLT) – A Multi-agency Educational Resource to Support Complex Public Protection Understanding and Practice

Heyman, Inga; Innes, Gavin; Goodhand, Kate

Abstract

Multi-agency public protection practice has received significant media and government scrutiny in recent years, in response to
failings to protect those most vulnerable people in society. Despite an appreciation by agencies that there are resource and outcome benefits to collaborative practice, how safeguarding public protection policy may be integrated into practice and
education is often challenging.
Public protection legislation directs core agencies to co-operate and work together with governmental direction setting out key shared safeguarding responsibilities and arrangements for individuals, professional groups and teams. Despite this there still remain difficulties between organisations to understand each other’s priorities and responsibilities. This can then transpose to an
individual level where entrenched professional divisions can compromise joint working.
Many health and social care curricula invest in inter-professional education to encourage exploration of information sharing,
reporting and case management. However, when public protection issues are considered, uni-professional and inter-professional
education tends to focus on single silos of harm, for example child and adult protection, radicalisation or domestic abuse.
This paper discusses the development, application and future possibilities for innovation of a unique educational tool to address
this gap in public protection multi-agency education. The tool aims to support understanding of key public protection issues in
Scotland by encouraging learners within undergraduate and practice environments to recognise risk, explore overlapping and ‘grey areas’ of harm and understand partner agency best practice and response whilst encouraging cross-sector working, appreciation and support. Through gaining insight into other agencies safeguarding roles the learner has the opportunity to gain a deeper insight and broader perspective of the complexities of interventions beyond their own discipline whilst recognising opportunities for joint resource management.

Citation

Heyman, I., Innes, G., & Goodhand, K. (2016). Collaborative Outcomes Learning Tool (COLT) – A Multi-agency Educational Resource to Support Complex Public Protection Understanding and Practice. Journal of Perspectives in Applied Academic Practice, 4(3), https://doi.org/10.14297/jpaap.v4i3.168

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Feb 9, 2016
• Online Publication Date: Jun 20, 2016
• Publication Date: Jun 20, 2016
• Deposit Date: Jan 23, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Nov 22, 2019
• Journal: Journal of Perspectives in Applied Academic Practice
• Print ISSN: 2051-9788
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 4
• Issue: 3
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.14297/jpaap.v4i3.168
• Keywords: Public protection, multi-agency, immersive, flexible learning, collaborative
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/669511