Caroline Chisholm Society Annual General Meetingcaroline.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/CEO-Report... · 2017-10-19 · Supporting pregnancy, children and families Our environment

Welcome!

Caroline Chisholm SocietyAnnual General Meeting

Supporting pregnancy, children and families

Caroline Chisholm SocietyReport to the Annual General Meeting

27 September 2016

Helen CooneyChief Executive Officer

Caroline Chisholm Society, Pregnancy and Family Support Service



Tonight we celebrate and get excited…

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Annual General Meetings are a chance to:• Celebrate the year past, and• Get excited about the year ahead.

Tonight, we’ll try to help do that by discussing:

• Annual Report 2015-16: Expectant and new mums and their families ‘Three strong sites’, and Our programs.

• Projects for the year ahead ‘Earlier’ Early Intervention: The Baby Box, and Vulnerability and Early Childhood Education and Care.


…but first, an organisational summary.

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Implementation needs to continue to be our focus• A building in Essendon,• Achieving outcomes and providing excellent services• Delivering projects - Baby Box & Kinder participation

Major strategic gaps in achieving a ‘platform for growth’• Meeting increasing regulatory expectations,• Casework support in Shepparton,• Group work (in all and/or some of its forms),• Service Record System (SRS),

which is a critical part of our vision for the new site in Essendon.

Progress against plans report in Jan/Feb for the planning sessions of the Board, the management team, and the staff and voluntary teams (especially in readiness for another Quality Review late in 2017.

• Annual Report 2014-15• Expectant and new mums and their families• ‘Three strong sites’, and• Our programs.

• Special projects• ‘Earlier’ Early Intervention: The Baby Box.• Vulnerability and

Early Childhood Education & Care

• The Caroline Chisholm Society into the future



Our environment in changing

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Commonwealth:• “Australian Priority Investment

Approach to Welfare” • Royal Commission into

Institutional Responses toChild Sexual Abuse

Victoria• Royal Commission into

Family Violence • Roadmap to Reform:

strong families, safe children• Homelessness and social

housing reform• The Education State

(incl. new Early Years Learning and Development Framework)

Local• Municipal Early Years Plans

(incl. new Best Start Guidelines)


Our tradition and values remain the same

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The Caroline Chisholm Society:

• has respect for life,

• is compassionate and caring,

• values social justice,

• believes in empowerment of women and families,

• recognises diversity, and

• operates accountably according to best practice.

See page 2-3 and 4







Reasons people seek our help

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Approx. 1300 clients (contacts), from a range of backgrounds,who face:• Issues with regard to parenting

and pregnancy,• Poverty,• Risk of Homelessness,• Mental Health concerns, • Social/Physical Isolation, and• Family violence

(current and historic).

Therefore their children do too…

Notes:- spike for pregnancy/parenting, poverty and migrant/refugee is by the nature of our service.- drug and alcohol issues not usually part of our remit due to child protection involvement.

CCS internal data

See page 28


Ethnicity of people seeking our help

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See page 28

CCS internal data


Where they live – and will be living

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See page 25 and 26


The difference we make

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See page 29 and 30







A few quick words on “three strong sites”

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Caroline Chisholm Society Strategy and Plan

Inspired by Caroline Chisholm, we support pregnancy, children and families. We were established in 1969 so that women can be supported to continue their pregnancies. The organisation has grown into a professional agency of social and community services for expectant and new mothers.

Our strategy is to grow into three sustainable locally embedded sites in Moonee Ponds Valley, Caroline Springs and Goulburn Valley by 2025. Our plan is for staff and volunteers to focus on effective services, strong finances and sound governance. Our plan outlines tasks that will ensure we have progressed towards our goal of being ‘bigger but not too big’ by 2020.

The organisation is clearly focussed on supporting women with their pregnancy and early parenting to create a safe and nurturing environment for children. In doing so, we aim to prevent and alleviate the impacts of poverty, homelessness, family violence and issues with mental health.

See page 9


Goulburn Valley• 40th Anniversary• Launch of ‘Friends of GVPFSS’

See pages 2, 8, 14-15, 16-17, 32


Goulburn Valley• Operational Review, resulting restructure and increased investment• Shepparton Collaboration for Pregnant and New Mothers

See in particular pages 2, 8, 14-15


Moonee Valley• Pregnancy and Early Parenting Hub• Keeping in touch w. Moonee Valley

See in particular page 4


Caroline Springs• New family friendly space• Encouraging our volunteers and community

See in particular pages 18, 20, 24, 31






• Short interventions:• Welfare and counselling appointments• Usually in Moonee Valley, Goulburn Valley

or by phone (esp. counselling)

• Longer interventions:• Family Services (incl. Engaging Wyndham

Families; Services Connect),• Specialist Homelessness Services

(incl. extending the worker’s role),• Parenting Groups, Playgroups

(incl. Mothers In Mind®)• Mentoring and Home Maintenance

(which are volunteer run programs)

• New and Pre-loved goods:• Incl. the ‘Women for Women’ program

See pages 16 to 23.


Our Programs

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The Baby Box – How it started

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• Helen Macpherson Smith Trust wanted to invest in collaboration in Shepparton.

• We applied to undertake a “Shepparton Collaboration for Expectant and New Mothers”.

• That meant we were to work with colleagues in Shepparton to:

• choose and deliver one or two achievable projects. • identify what our future focus should be for support

for mothers and their families, including children and their fathers.

• inform decision making about sustainability.• We considered several options – parenting groups,

volunteer programs, perinatal mental health groups, family violence groups (e.g. MIM®), material aid, enhancing our liaison with Kindergartens, advocacy for complex collaboration projects, coordination processes, breastfeeding support and more. Some ideas were realistic, some less so.

See page 8, our press releaseand next year’s annual report!


The Baby Box – How did we decide and why

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Gathered ‘critical friends’ and gave them this criteria:• Fit: Is a good organisational fit, does not duplicate current core business for GVPFSS, and is within

the capability of our team?• Need: Does it meet the needs of new and expectant mothers in our community? (Needs Analysis)• Collaboration: Does it not duplicate services, create mixed messages or project a piece meal

approach to service provision? (Service Mapping) Local: Does it allow for local governance, engagement of local volunteers, and ongoing collaboration?

• Future funding: Is it suited to future funding options? Does it provide opportunities to work with agencies with whom we have skill matches.

• Measurable outcomes: Is able to be measured within the confines of a short pilot to assure effectiveness, and also build the argument for future funding?

Why the Box? Because it’s a ‘simple, safe and supportive idea’• We love its simplicity; it’s a box that’s recyclable and can become a toy box. • We love its safety; it’s a great way to encourage safe sleeping practices. • We love its model of support; it’s a way to engage with families to prevent

social isolation, family violence, the impacts of homelessness and engagement with child protection.


The Baby Box – What we launched

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A Baby Box for all of Shepparton’s Spring 2016 babies.

• On Wednesday 14 September, the Goulburn Valley Collaboration Co-ordinator, Belinda Guilmartin, gave out the first boxes and co-design with local mums a parenting survey. Soon, a total of 250 Baby Boxes will be available.

• Centred around the free provision of a Baby Box—which is lined with a mattress and is used as a child's first bed—the Collaboration is designed to promote the importance of preparedness for parenting, reading and promote services available, including antenatal classes, maternal and child health appointments, and family and parenting services. It will also reinforce safe sleeping messages.

Testing our model with the first 35 boxes.

The model:• Everyone is offered a box until 250 are gone.• Those getting a Baby Box complete survey (on parenting, but also social,

emotional, wellbeing & economic capital) orthey give us a certificate that says they’ve done so already

• They self identify (or with our help) if they wish for a referral, advice or support with an appointment with our team.

• We complete a safety process for distribution• At a follow up appointment, they do the survey again to see if their

knowledge and/or confidence has improved. And some other questions.

Testing?• We are working with families to see how they think it should work.• Learnings to date:

• There are questions in the survey that need redrafting, and language/literacy is a barrier.

• Data collection, sharing/consent isn’t clear enough.• How it interfaces with our ‘welfare appointments program’.


The Baby Box – What’s happening now?

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Shepparton Collaboration for pregnant and new mothers

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Want a Baby Box?Call or email us. Tel: 03 5821 0826Email: [email protected]

Want to contribute artwork?Go to www.caroline.org.au for the form.

As part of the ‘Collaboration’, we also want to help our community advocate for a mother baby unit.Shepparton needs a residential service like that offered by Tweddle in Western Melbourne, Queen Elizabeth Centre in Noble Park, and Karinya House in Canberra.

http://www.caroline.org.au/







Two exciting projects

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See next year’s annual report!

1. Brimbank | MeltonPre-purchased kindergarten places

CCS staff are seconded to Early Childhood Management Services

2. Melton – Vulnerability Guide

Proudly supported byThe Club at Caroline Springs

Early Childhood Management Services

Pre-purchased Kindergarten

Places

Brimbank & Melton

ObjectiveAs taken from initial Expression of Interest

• Assist kindergarten services within the catchment area to fill pre-purchased places and sustain attendance.

• Support kindergarten services and key referral agencies to engage families experiencing vulnerability and disadvantage to enrol children who will be eligible for three and four year old kindergarten for 2017 and beyond.

• Support families who are experiencing vulnerability and disadvantage to access pre-purchased places. Priority cohorts include:

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children

children known to Child Protection, including those in out-of-home-care

children eligible for Early Start Kindergarten and extension grant

children eligible for Kindergarten Fee Subsidy

• Additionally, participation support will focus on supporting services to engage families to increase access to three and four year old kindergarten programs in 2017.

Partnership Consortium

In April 2016, following successful submission to pilot the Outreach Family Support Project in

Brimbank and Melton – a partnership consortium was formed to oversee the pilot, ensuring all parties

had input and the work was nested into existing local community projects for maximum efficiency.

Members:• Brimbank and Melton Council

• Best Start (Brimbank & Melton)

• BPA Childrens Services

• TRY Australia

• Korrie Engagement Support Officers

• ECMS

• Child Protection Services

• Regional Performance and Planning, DET

ActivityThree Key Elements

1. Employ Outreach Family Support Workers to engage with ECEC and carve pathways from secondary and tertiary services into pre-purchased kindergarten places beyond 2017

2. Provide training and professional Development for ECEC staff on how to support participation and work in partnership with other service providers to support families

3. Document key learnings from the Pilot and produce a three minute You Tube video capturing narrative from children, families, teachers and partners on their participation in this pilot

Model

This is an 'Early Years Outreach Family Support Model' with a strong focus on the goal of building sustainable inclusion practices beyond 2017

The project has a long term outcomes focus as it will pilot 'carving pathways' between existing service provisions to better use what already exists and extend the interface between primary/secondary/tertiary service providers to work more efficiently and collaboratively going forward

The project aim is to develop, deliver, document and disseminating an integrated process that builds collaborative practices using existing resources more effectively.

Eligibility

In striving to ensure these places are targeting the most vulnerable families, these criteria would warrant children a ‘Priority of Access’ to a Purchase Place

Priority of Access

• 3YO ESK in 4YO program – automatically assigned

• Non Eligible 3YO ESK child, now in 4YO (AGL 3YO situation)

• Out of Home Care

• Child Protection/Child FIRST involvement

• Early Intervention

• Illness/disability of child or family member

• KFS, but not valid for the entire year

• Refugee status – (non English speaking background)

• Aboriginal Torre Strait Islander

• Kindergarten Fee Subsidy

Beyond 2016….

Central Enrolments for 2017

We are keen to use this 12 month pilot to

look at finding and prioritizing vulnerable

children NOW, to enter them into the

central enrolment systems in both

Councils for 2017

This process starts NOW with first,

second and third round offers going out

in September – November

We are aiming to have infiltrated the

Central Enrolment System and have

these children at the centre of the system

this year for commencement next year.

Contacts:

Email: [email protected] - Brimbank

[email protected] – Melton

Website: www.ecms.org.au

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ecmschildren

Twitter: twitter.com/ecms_childhood

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]


VULNERABILITY GUIDE

PROJECT

Source: Australian Early Development Census

THE IMPORTANCE OF RECOGNIZING VULNERABILITY EARLIER

BRAIN DEVELOPMENT IN EARLY CHILDHOOD

• The frontal lobe develops improperly when deprived of affection and positive emotional experiences

• The lack of stimulation causes neurons in the brain to die off

• Any positive experiences during this period has a huge impact on a child’s brain development


Meeting service providers to introduce project &

gather ideas

Meeting with stakeholders to

brainstorm and assess service providers training

needs

Plan and organise training sessions

Tailor the training according to the needs of

service providers. Organising and planning sessions in line with the

trainees needs

Deliver trainings

• Individual training sessions for service providers 3 sessions in total

• MCHN

• Kindergarten teachers

• Train the trainer

Collect pilot data and report

Pilot data collection November 2016.

Understanding vulnerability








Shall we keep celebrating Mother’s Day?See page 31

What a year!

Thank you forwhat you do to

‘help those in need’

Any questions?


Caroline Chisholm Society Annual General Meetingcaroline.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/CEO-Report... · 2017-10-19 · Supporting pregnancy, children and families Our environment

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