Social workers celebrated on World Social Work Day
A social worker shows animated social worker figures to a child at Shanghai Children's Hospital.
Social workers show animated social worker figures to children at Shanghai Children's Hospital.
Ten outstanding social workers were rewarded for their efforts by the city civil affairs authorities on Tuesday, the 13th World Social Work Day.
In addition, 10 outstanding projects were also recognized.
These include Fu Lili, director of social work at Fudan university Children's Hospital, and Zhang Haiyan, a psychological consultant.
Fu has done an outstanding job in crisis intervention, volunteer management, children's organ donation, parental supports, support for medical workers and charities, according to Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau.
She also founded a choir for patients, and hosted a number of charity activities to raise funds. Last year, the department raised 35 million yuan (US$5.2 million) and helped about 1,400 needy patients.
Zhang established a workshop for parents and teachers' as part of a support network to handle the psychological problems of children.
"The work of social workers is small, but we hope to play a big role in helping people ignite their lives," said social worker Lang Sicheng.
Meanwhile, Shanghai Children's Hospital released six animated social worker figures on the day to help child patients more easily recognize social workers and build good relationship with them.
Each figure has their own names, characteristics and stories.
"Social workers conduct various psychological service, emotional relief, hospice, and domestic violence screening for children patients at the hospital," said Niu Jun, director of the social work department of the hospital.
"They are often deemed as doctors for wearing the same uniform when conducting services, and these figures will make them more recognizable and more easily for them to soothe children," he said.
The hospital aims to release 12 such figures in total.
Shanghai has 27,344 registered social workers, employed in more than 20 areas such as community building, drug rehabilitation and health.
The city has 603 social work agencies.
