Profile: Vicki Welch
Vicki Welch is the Research Lead at the Centre for Excellence for Looked After Children in Scotland (CELCIS), University of Strathclyde
As a child what did you want to be when you grew up?
When I was very young I wanted to be a vet or a surgeon, but by the time I was a teenager I knew that I wanted to be a researcher. The only problem was that the only model I had in my head for research involved test-tubes and labcoats. Hence the first 8 years of my working life I was an analytical chemist at the Water Research Centre where I was involved in working up some new methods for the water treatment industry. Smelly work, but I enjoyed having access to a lab and the facilities to ‘experiment’.
When did you turn towards social research?
I think I was always interested how societies could make things better and why this often didn't happen. This became much more real for me when I had my first child and got interested in children and family services. I made the decision to re-train in health and social welfare which I first did through the OU while my own children were very small.
What was your first professional job as a social researcher? And first project there?
My first job in social research was as a field researcher working for NatCen (they were called something else at the time). I was conducting CAPI interviews with young people and their families in a pilot area for Educational Maintenance Allowance.
How has your career panned out since?
I wouldn't say it was a very planned path for career development but it has worked out well. I have been lucky enough to have a number of really interesting posts, first with University of Plymouth working up through the ranks, then as a manager for a Local Authority, then back into academia at Lancaster University and now in CELCIS at Strathclyde University. My main bug-bear with social research careers is that so many of us have to experience the insecurity of having consecutive short term contracts.
What has been your best professional moment? and worst?
Hard to say, as they are often flip sides of the same occasion. For example, 20 years ago during an interview with a young person who’d left care to live independently, he shared very strong feelings about being unable to get access to his new baby which was both wonderful and heartbreaking. I felt it was such an honour that he trusted me in this way. I have had a few experiences like this now and they stay with you for a long time.
In your work what gives you the most satisfaction?
Having a small role in opening up the way people think about an issue; that moment when you see someone who has the power to make a difference suddenly understand a new perspective or get a key piece of information that makes it all fall into place.
Do you have a favourite quote?
I love lots of quotes, but something I heard on the Radio 4 programme ‘Analysis’ really made me smile, I can’t remember who said it. “The search for certainty is not a sin, finding it is (slight pause) err, probably”. This sums up how I feel about my own work, frequently uncertain and professionally sceptic.
Do you have a social research hero/heroine?
It may sound a bit twee but, every child, young person or family member that has agreed to take part in social research is a hero as without their participation we really are nothing.
What would your advice be to new social researchers?
Apart from wishing them luck and telling them not to expect to get rich, I think I would advise them to constantly think about their own reasons for doing the job and how these might impact on what they do.
Interview by William Solesbury
