Svenja Bluhm, M.A.

• Relational approaches in social work
• Child protection
• (Sexualised) violence and processes of disclousure in social institutions and church settings
• Qualitative social research

After completing my Bachelor's degree in Pedagogy and Sociology in Osnabrück, I found my professional path into research via the Master's programme in Educational Science at the Freie Universität Berlin. In 2021, I started working as an academic associate at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam in a research project on sexualised violence in institutions of the protestant church (with a focus on protestant kindergartens). Since November 2023, I have been working in the P³Dual project and, in addition to the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam, I work at my practice partner FamilienANlauf e. V. in Berlin-Lichtenberg in youth welfare. As part of P³Dual, I am doing my doctorate on the topic of child protection in relational social work settings.

• Since November 2023: Research associate on the “P³Dual” project, pursuing a Ph.D. on the topic “Relational Child Protection – An Ethnographic Analysis of Child Protection Practices in Relational Contexts of Child and Youth Welfare, Using the Example of Multifamily Therapy” (project period: November 2023–October 2026, ongoing).
  Project description: My dissertation project examines how child protection is implemented in relational support settings operated by independent social service providers in the field of child and youth welfare. To this end, I am conducting ethnographic research on support settings that incorporate elements of multi-family therapy at the social work organization and practice partner FamilienANlauf e. V. These are support settings that aim to ensure and strengthen the protection and support of children in the participating families through relational approaches—so relational child protection. The goal of the research project is to develop an empirically grounded theory of child protection practices in relational support settings and thereby create an empirical foundation for the transfer of theory into practice. 
  The doctoral program is conducted in cooperation with the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen.
  Primary supervisor: Prof. Dr. Friederike Lorenz-Sinai (University of Tübingen)
  Secondary supervisor: Prof. Dr. Frank Früchtel (Potsdam University of Applied Sciences)
  Practice partner: FamilienANlauf e. V.
• October 2021 – October 2023: Scientific collaboration in sub-project B "Organisation and person: systemic conditions and practice of dealing with (sexualised) violence" of the research network "ForuM - Dealing with sexualised violence and other forms of abuse in the Protestant Church and Diaconia in Germany" under the direction of Prof. Dr. Friederike Lorenz-Sinai (FH Potsdam) and Prof. Dr. Fabian Kessl (Bergische Universität Wuppertal). Projektzeitraum 03/2021 – 03/2024.
• October 2022 – January 2023: Scientific collaboration in the research project "Reappraisal of the violent constellation of the 1950s in the Protestant school hostel Martinstift in Moers" at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam in cooperation with the Bergische Universität Wuppertal, funded by the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland, Moers church district, Moers church community and Diakonisches Werk Rheinland-Westfalen-Lippe. Projektzeitraum: 04/2022 – 01/2023.