Tiltai

Scientific journal Tiltai / Bridges / Brücken published by Klaipėda University (established in 1991) is devoted to the issues of social sciences, and seeking academic dialogue, also to other human and society functioning-related humanities and biomedical sciences, with expand and interpret different social phenomena and current issues from an interdisciplinary perspective. The publications attempts at analysing and solving actual problems of economy, management, demography, social geography, geopolitics, political sciences, history, education, religious, regional planning and land use, other social problems. Science has no borders. Therefore scientific cooperation is one of the most important elements in the progress of world’s community. Scientists from different countries of the world are kindly invited to write for and contribute to the journal.Tiltai / Bridges is the scientifical periodical magazine, which publications, by the decision of Lithuanian Science Council, are recognized as convenient for doctoral dissertations and pedagogical scientific names.

History of professional Caritative Social work content reaches back to the beginning of Christian era. The content and basis of Caritative social work reveals the understanding of social dimension and general conceiving of human beings from the Christian perspective. Solidarity and cooperation, caritative attitude, the value of personality, fraternity made Christianity as principally a social religion. The mediating concepts such as subsidiarity, liberty, solidarity, fraternity and equality can be viewed of unity of human kind in Christ. Article deals with Christian heritage of Europe contributing to commonly shared worldview and reveals the role of Caritative social ministry as ethos of Eastern Orthodox Christianity against the Western subjective individualism. The spirit of egalitarianism is deeply embedded in the body and soul of Eastern Christianity. There is no place for race / social discrimination in Eastern Christianity despite of its highly hierarchical structure. Christians still should stay with their civil tasks and obligations through Caritative Social work since their vision of “the self” is social.

The aim of this study was to describe family social work through analyzing the roles of social workers. Qualitative research was carried out in three big cities of Lithuania: Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipėda. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 family social workers. A discursive psychology approach was chosen. Family social workers’ interpretative roles repertoires appear among professional, public and organizational discourses. The results showed that family social workers categorise professional roles in relation to different everyday practices that depend on situated language use in the contexts in which they take place.

The goal of the article is to describe the contribution of ecclesial or Church communities to the development of community work and the ways people get involved in community activities, seeing ecclesial communities as form of religious capital in society for regenerating the society and individuals. In the richness of community activities of Christian Church that are socially or caritatively-oriented, it is possible to find resources, with which the Christian Church can reach the people in need and fulfil its mission. Thus, the context of the article is the practical concept of Caritative Social Work being practiced in practical domains of modern social protection system. One of the factors, chosen for studying in this article, will be religious capital with its inner constituting conditions in order there could take place their activation in community environment. The task here is to explore specific social and religious factors and principles of action that would provide more full understanding about the effectiveness of functioning of local religious communities and their influence on community development. The article will end by case study analysis of two Christian ecclesial communities and deriving working principles, finding out which elements and principles of ecclesial community can constitute the effective community of social rehabilitation.

Society’s value system forms gradually, and every society has its own culture, its own dominant value system. Fundamental values such as honesty, fairness, compassion and kindness have been preserved through the centuries, and they are the core values of today. Organization values are invisible organizational culture, the deepest layer of the organization. The internal culture of institutions is the system of values and traditions, work environment, which is an important condition for staff satisfaction and performance efficiency. Latvian public administration declared value is incorporated into the code of ethics, also included in the organization documents, thus addressing not only their employees, but also society as a whole, what is the profession of the required values, as well as what human values should be never lost. In this study, in order to identify the predominant values and intrinsic values of institutions based on publicly available data and information sources, Latvian State Administration Policy declared value are discussed and analyzed.

The authors of this article argue that work in the 21st century is more complex instead of being routine. Solution of education management problems in the Baltic Region is greatly affected by system approach ideas that treat actions as a unified system that consists of mutually related elements with constant interaction of internal and external environment factors. The evolving nature of school environment has placed new demands on educational leaders. Where knowledge of school management, finance, legal issue and state mandates was once the primary focus for the preparation of school leaders, education reform has created an urgent need for a strong emphasis on development of instructional leadership skills to promote good teaching and high level learning. Educational leaders must recognize and assume a shared responsibility not only for students’ intellectual and educational development, but also for their personal, social, emotional and physical development. In the article was discovered that school principals need to improve their management competences in personnel management, financial and communication management for successful school leadership.

Higher education curriculum has been a subject of various disputes in the scholar literature. Official curriculum (such as study programme description, syllabus, study material) and unplanned hidden curriculum that occurs in during the learning process. Official curriculum defines learning goals, tasks, methods and learning outcomes. Meanwhile actual learning process contains not only the official parts of the curriculum, but also knowledge that is created and shared during learning process, especially in collaborative learning environments. That leads to assumption, that collaboration between learners and knowledge sharing is a condition for hidden curriculum to appear. In this article, a problem question is analysed: what elements of collaborative learning enables hidden curriculum in study educational environments? Main goal, using scholar literature analysis, to define the balance between official and hidden curriculum in collaborative learning environments. The article looks into the definitions of official and hidden curriculum and applications in study environments. Certain variations of collaborative learning allow to reach different levels of interaction (and hidden curriculum). The application of collaborative learning in study process has to be well guided and balanced, encouraging students to work in homogenous groups seeking for one well defined purpose.

The article presents the results of continuing research performed at Vytautas Magnus University and Lithuanian University of Health Sciences which justifies the importance of collboration between social workers and other professionals working in the field of helping professions, creating a person’s supportive social environment, which the article perceives as a unity environment. There are analyzed theoretical and empirical aspects of cooperation between social workers, health professionals and educators, emphasizing the conceptual attitude of personal empowerment and its significance in an aging, transforming society. The interpretation of the research results revealed, the interdisciplinary cooperation in practice is discussed, the changes of professional training and continuing education are highlighted, emphasizing readiness to work in an interdisciplinary team. In the first part of the article there are discussed social tensions, their expression in social work and healthcare practice, revealing the challenges for a person – a professional and a client. The second part of the article highlights the interdisciplinary communication, leading to the creation of enabling environment of unity, and the importance of social tensions in the context of supportive cooperation discussed resolution it’s practice. In the third part there are analyzed cases for the conditions and possibilities of educational interdisciplinary cooperation: the results of the analysis of medical and social work study programs are reflected; introduced changes in the organization of study programs, discussed the expression of innovations in study programs and practice. There is emphasized counseling as a key factor in educational change in the implementation of a “learner center”, a lifelong learning strategy in the process of continuing education. In formal professional training, this can ensure the position of the tutor, empowering systematic studying; in practice, supervisor encouraging reflection on professional experience, thus developing competence.

The article deals with the profession of Caritative social worker, its legitimate status in Latvia, as well with historical roots of the profession and its methodology. It is based on the Judeo-Christian anthropological paradigm and is reflected in European guidelines for Social work development, stemming from the founders’ of the European Union concept of the Social stand of man and human dignity as spiritual subject.

Young people with disabilities are one of the most sensitive groups of society because they are discriminated against by stereotypes of disability, sewing in the labor market and education. This is acknowledged by organizations operating in the field of international human rights and disability, which are mentioned in documents protecting the rights of persons with disabilities, are reflected in the researches of Lithuanian and foreign scientists. A child’s autism diagnosis affects every member of the family in different ways. Parents / caregivers must now place their primary focus on helping their child with ASD, which may put stress on their marriage, other children, work, finances, and personal relationships and responsibilities. The theoretical part of the article examines disabilities, conceptual basics of a autism. The empirical part is compliant with a provision that a human life can be understood by analysing one’s experience, opinions, worldview, and context. The justification of the research methodology – narrative analysis – is presented. The study involves demographic characteristics of fourth people – parents (male sex), circumstances of research data collection, the role of the researcher is revealed. Data processing is carried out in accordance with the methodological requirements of the dialogical narrative analysis. Conclusions are drawn with regard to the phenomenon – perception of the career of young people with slight intellectual disabilities.