[Lilly92]

Hi, I am considering applying for Keele University as my first choice for social work MA. It says on the entry requirements page that there is a written test. Can someone please explain the written test to me, such as the questions that come up and the amount of questions there are.
Thank you.

[Tartarus]

Hi I haven't taken the test at Keele but have done the written test at Northumbria, I can tell you about that but can't promise it will be any help.

We were given a government report to read and there were 3 questions we had to answer on it. The report was about older service users views and experiences with social workers and the questions were
1- what were the key findings of the report
2- how can the findings be helpful in the social work sector
3- I think the last one was about problems/difficulties that could relate to the report (but I'm not 100%on this one it was a few months ago)

We were also told were marked on how it was written and presented so the 3 questions counted for 75% and the presentation 25% and the lecturer said that they were mainly looking to determine that we could write at postgraduate level and ready to study at that level.

I assume yours will be similar, I found the main problem to be poor time keeping on my part I spent to much on he first question and not enough on the others also it was impossible to read the whole report as it was 20 pages of writing.

There is a ma social work Northumbria thread on this topic you might find more help there.

Good luck

[Lilly92]

Ok, thank you. That was very helpful.

Did you find that it was helpful to have a lot of prior knowledge of social work before taking any tests/interviews??

Im currently studying Criminology so I definetly don't feel tat I know enough about social care to be able to take exams about Government reports etc.

[Tartarus]

Yeah I think it was quite helpful to have some background information especially with regard goths actual role of a social worker and some basic knowledge of the sectors in which they work. My previous degree had a great deal of social policy and background info involved so I found that helpful however some of it is common sense and you may realise you know more than you think if you keep up to date with news etc. we were told to read the guardian as they have articles about social work sector on tues,wed and thurs I think.

It was definitely helpful for the interview as the questions they asked were very much based on the job such as what do you think a social worker does? What areas could they work in? What are struggles they could face? How would they cope with stress of the job? And then I was asked how I had coped in a stressful situation