Greetings to all our members and wishing you all a wonderful World Social Work Day.
This is the first of regular Briefings for IFSW Europe members. If you have anything to be included, we will ask for contributions a few weeks before the next one is produced which we expect to be in early June. We will add this briefing to our Facebook and LinkedIn pages and upload it to the IFSW.org website.
World Social Work Day – 18th March 2025
We hope you are all celebrating and taking time to reflect on our profession and join with other social workers to consider the 2025 theme of ‘Strengthening Intergenerational Solidarity for Enduring Wellbeing’. You can read IFSW Europe President Ruth Allen’s statement on the WSWD theme and greetings to all social workers on this celebratory day.
See what some of our members across Europe are doing to celebrate WSWD 2025!
Georgia
Georgian social workers (GASW), like others across Europe, who we stand in solidarity with, are navigating a challenging context. Despite challenges, GASW which is committed to preventing polarization within the profession are holding a conference initiated by the Georgian Association of Social Workers in collaboration with World Vision Georgia, the Public Health Foundation of Georgia, Tbilisi State University and Ilia State University. Dedicated to the memory of Maya Mgeliashvili recognising Maya’s significant contributions to the advancement of social work, particularly in the realms of childcare and welfare.
Austria
Austrian social workers together with Schools of Social Work, stakeholders and others are contributing with activities all over Austria, a list of their activities can be found on their website. https://obds.at/wswd/wswd_2025/#wswd2025eventsTheir newsletter informs all people interested in SW in Austria, it is German only, but please subscribe! https://obds.at/newsletter/. See image at the top of this page!
Romania
On March 18, 2025, in celebration of World Social Work Day, National College of Social Workers (CNASR) a regulatory, independent, and apolitical body tasked with protecting interests of the social work profession and its practitioners, will honor the contributions of social workers with the 11th edition of the Social Work Excellence Gala. Dedicated to recognizing the invaluable role that social workers play in enhancing the wellbeing of citizen https://cnasr.ro/gala/2025/. On February 20, 2025, Romanian social workers CNASR marked 20 years since the organisation’s official legal establishment. Join their Facebook page.
United Kingdom
The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) is celebrating across the UK in person and online in their own events and supporting the celebrations of social workers across the four nations. Throughout this period, staff and lead members will be attending celebrations in workplaces and universities. You can read about all events here https://basw.co.uk/search?s=world%2Bsocial%2Bwork%2Bday%2B2025 which include:
Throughout March, BASW announces the year’s ‘Amazing Social Workers’ – 400 this year! These social workers are nominated by colleagues and people using services – see more here https://basw.co.uk/about-basw/awards/amazing-social-workers-2025
Please send your news from World Social Work Day for the next Briefing.
Oslo Conference
The next IFSW European Social Work conference 2025 Bridging Communities- Building Sustainable Futures will be on 6th-8th October. The theme of the conference will address the latest challenges of our time, being the impact of climate change on both individuals and societies. Simultaneously, the deadline for achieving the UN’s sustainability goals is rapidly approaching. Where do we stand, and what remains to be done? How can social workers contribute? What is the hope for the future? What can we as social workers learn from indigenous perspectives? How can we build a sustainable future together? We hope we’ll see you there.
IFSW Europe regional conference 2025 – International Federation of Social Workers
Bridging Communities: Building Sustainable Futures – IFSW 2025
Executive News
IFSW Strategy 2025-2027
Many thanks to the members who voted online on the adoption of the IFSW Europe Strategy. Twenty-one votes were cast out of a possible thirty-one (number of paid members in Europe), all in favour meaning the strategy is adopted by a majority of members (68%).
The Executive will now turn the strategic aims into specific actions and priorities in annual work plans and will report progress to the Delegate’s Meetings.
Audit and Budget 2025
At the last Delegates’ Meeting, we were waiting for the audit of accounts for 2023. These have now been completed. We have also reviewed the budget lines in the 2025 budget and made some small adjustments to take account of costs and changes in projects we are running.
The Audit Report and the proposed Budget for 2025 will be sent to members for an online vote in April. Please do vote on this when you receive the voting link, and/or raise any queries via the europe@i fsw.org email address.
Executive meetings update
The IFSW Europe Executive met 14-16 March in Oslo. We were there in part to support our Norwegian colleagues who are organizing the IFSW Europe conference in Oslo in October this year and to visit the venue (which is excellent!).
This was the first in-person Executive meeting since the Delegate’s Meeting (DM) in Lisbon. A fuller report of the meeting will be shared with members separately, but in brief, we made progress on decisions and actions from the DM and went through the newly adopted two-year strategy to identify priority actions for the rest of 2025. We met with the New Social Workers group online to discuss their next steps in developing the voice and engagement of new social workers.
The Executive team
You’ll be getting to know them more in future additions of this news briefings! For now, here’s a photo of the full Executive team including deputies: Back row and on screen, left to right: Brian Auslander (Treasurer), Paola Pontarello and Lucia Gonzales (both Deputy Executive Members), Jill Childs (Honorary Secretary), Susanne Both (Executive Member); Front Row left to right: Kristine Evertz (Executive Member); Enric Torres (Executive Member), Ruth Allen (President) and our host in Oslo, Andreas Kikvik (Vice President).
We are working with and for you – and look forward to meeting again soon!