escare incorporated annual report 2016 -2017 - escare.org.au · 1 escare incorporated : annual...

Escare Incorporated

Annual Report 2016-2017

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Escare Incorporated : Annual Report 2016-2017

Message from the Service Manager

Our mission is “to increase the capacity of individuals and families, to assist with daily living challenges, and to

enrich community life” and it has been another year full of wonderful programs on offer to the Esperance

community. This is a result of a greatly innovative and passionate team, together with strong leadership from

the Escare Board.

Escare aims to be accountable and continue to embed Social Outcomes Measurement including Results-based

Accountability outcome measures to several of our projects and new Culture Counts subscription to support

these endeavours.

We had many highlights for the year:

· Escare continues to build partnerships with community stakeholders and this year collaborations included

the initiation of projects with Esperance Community Arts and Esperance Psychology for delivery next

financial year.

· Escare takes a lead role to be “champion” other agencies, for example we collaborated with the Early

Years Network in Esperance to host Professional Development by organising training in Esperance.

Successful training events were held including Protective Behaviour and Ngala workshops.

· In an innovative partnership with Esperance Psychology, Andrew Fuller developed a program for delivery

in Esperance, with support from GEDC funding and other local support.

· Escare worked with Parenting Connections in Kalgoorlie to bring Parenting workshops to Esperance.

· Escare developed and adopted a new Constitution in accordance with the Associations Incorporation Act

2015 which commenced 1 July 2016.

· Escare has been represented at important peak body events such as WACOSS conference, FCAWA

Conference and inaugural managers meeting, Child Care Alliance; Early years Conference, Linkwest

Conference, Community Resilience Conference, Wesley Suicide Prevention Conference; Stronger

Communities Consultation .

A challenging time with machinery of Government changes (Funding Departments now all together in

Department for Communities) brings uncertainty and hopefully opportunities. Escare campaigned as part of

the “Because it’s good to belong” initiative run by Linkwest, focusing on the strengths of grass roots services.

We look forward to another year working in partnership and leading projects that will have a positive impact

on our community.

We said farewell to Anna Bonney, our Youth Worker, and Charisse Parkyn, our bookkeeper

(and Lotteries House receptionist for many years). We welcomed to Renae Rance our new

Bookkeeper.

Thanks to our dedicated and hardworking team who continue to endeavour to make a

difference in the community,

Jo Aberle

Escare Service Manager

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About Escare Incorporated

Escare Incorporated, an organisation whose name is derived from ‘Es’-perance and the word ‘care’, has

delivered Family Support programs for over 30 years in Esperance. Incorporated in 1982, the organisation is

‘outcomes’ focused, working in partnership with individuals, families, community and funding bodies, thereby

reflecting emerging trends.

Escare Services and Programs

· The Financial Counselling service offers assistance with financial matters including budgeting and practical

support around settlement of debts.

· The Family & Community Service offers individual consultation, community education and community

building projects.

· The Youth Service (for at Risk young people) offers recreational and diversionary activities as well as case

management.

· Esperance Outside School Hours Care provides the only such service in Esperance for After School and

Vacation Care. The service also provides crèche facilities to support running of workshops and groups.

(Fee based and subsidy from Commonwealth Department Education)

· The One & All project offers targeted, local opportunities for people with a disability to participate in

mainstream sport, recreation and community activities build relationships with able-bodied peers and

increase understanding of disability in the wider community of Esperance. (small grants)

· The Caring 4 Carers Project aims to identify and trial respite options for carers of a family member with a

disability.

· The C.A.R.E. project – facilitated Community Awareness and Regional Education

The Team

· Jo Aberle - Service Manager

· Karen Collins - Administration, Finance & IT

· Natalie Symonds - Community Development

Officer

· Peta Horan - Financial Counsellor

· Megs Sims - Family & Community Worker

· Linda Tobin - One and All project facilitator,

Caring 4 Carers and Youth Worker

· Colleen Frost – casual Community

Engagement worker

· Renae Rance - Bookkeeper

· Lyn Gallagher - Outside School Hours Care

Coordinator

· Lyn Daly - casual Educator

· Lynette Johnson – part-time Educator

· Cathy Archer, Roseanne Rider & Alma

Perfrement - casual Educators

· Jennell Reynolds –Aboriginal Arts

Coordinator (with ECA)

· Escare was fortunate to retain the services of Leanne Burr as a student performing work experience

for 3 months. Leanne was invaluable in supporting the C.A.R.E project as well as applications for Kids

Fun Day Out funding and being part of the Escare fabric.

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Strategic Direction

Escare has a Strategic Plan with strategic priorities of: Sustainability, Partnerships & Networking, Best

Practice, Community Education, Inclusiveness and Service Excellence.

1 Sustainability

Escare Inc operates a community service which is sustainable through continued funding of its core services,

supplemented by non-service funding which supports projects and activities including the Esperance Outside School

Hours Care service (EOSHC).

Esperance Outside School Hours Care (established 1994) provides After School and Vacation Care for kindy-

year 6 primary school aged children.

The service has sustained its increased attendance and income covered centre expenditure, a good result as

the service receives only a small subsidy from the Commonwealth Government, relying upon strong

attendance and fees. This subsidy will cease in July 2018 so it is important that the centre maintain high

numbers. The service has not had to increase fees as we try to keep the service as affordable as possible. We

have recently submitted for sustainability funding via Commonwealth Grants, we hope to hear the outcome

of this in April 2018.

The staff, led by Lyn Gallagher, have done a wonderful job in keeping activities fun and interesting. The service

takes children from Kindy to Grade 6 and we have a beautiful group of children attending the service. Children

include those who may have special needs and who maybe in ‘out of home’ care.

The service is run under the guidelines of the National Quality Assurance process and we have three goals and

are working towards two. Our natural landscape garden has established with grateful thanks to guidance from

Joanne Halliday and the children enjoying this space. s

In 2017 we finalised spending of our Lotterywest grant with upgrade to the kitchen bench; this together with

previous purchases have made a huge improvement to our facilities.

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Value Adding grants:

Escare received a grant from Lotterywest to support the purchase of another commuter bus thus providing

much needed improvement to our service.

Escare is very appreciative of additional funding as it adds value to our non-service programs and helps sustain

the organisation in its ability to achieve innovative activities in partnership with local community groups and

agencies

Lotterywest: $15.000 Aboriginal Arts Project (with ECA)

$25.000 Kids’ Fun Day April 2018

Ngala: $11616 My Time program

Esperance Shire: $3500 Resilient Youth workshops

$5000 for Kids’ Fun Day 2018

$1000 for the One and All Inclusion program

GEDC $29.000 CARE Workshops

Disability Services Commission: $45000 Caring for Carers Project

Department for Communities $1000 Youth Week

$2000 Children Week grants

Commonwealth Carers $1000 (respite for My Time)

REX Flights $800

Cliffs Natural Resources $10000 for Kid’s Fun Day 2018

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2 Partnerships and Networking

Escare Incorporated is a respected and esteemed service providing delivery enrichment to projects and activities

through strong relationships with other organisations within the community.

Key Partnerships and Activities

· GIFSA and Our Lady Star of The Sea School : ‘Esperance Brick Club’

weekly sessions are held during school term. BrickClub is a shared

interest group for children aged 5 to 15 who have a love of brick

construction. Due to the nature of play associated with brick

construction the club is attractive to children on the autism spectrum.

· Ngala : The conducting of over 50 workshops including Sleep, Child

Development, Growing Strong Brains, professional development for

Child Care educators as well as working with Young girls group as part

of Escare Youth Services has been well received and supported.

· Ngala: My Time Support group with weekly session during school term

group participated in Art To Wear as part of the Festival of the Wind

and enjoyed respite, funded by Commonwealth Carers.

· Disability Services Commission : funding the Caring 4 Carers project.

· Crossroads West : providing active support whilst working with people

who have been under the care of the State.

· Clontarf football Academy: Health Checks and Football games

· BOICO and Esperance Shire: One and All inclusion Community Program

· Salvation Army : Christmas hampers; Uniting Care West : Christmas

Presents

· Women Learning For Life; Centre Care; Explore Esperance group;

Bunnings and Men In Sheds; Health Department.

· Parenting Connections – a new service to Goldfields providing

brokerage funds to Esperance area. Escare has been integral in

supporting this service via Local Area Parenting group who meet after

EYN.

· In addition, Escare has memorandums of understanding with

Centrecare, BOICO, GIFSA; Red Cross Kalgoorlie, Aboriginal Legal

Service, Crossroads and Ngala.

· The Esperance Early Year’s Network meet regularly to network and

identify emerging trends and held a wonderful Aboriginal Children Day

celebration with several agencies offering activities and lots of families

enjoying the day .

· Escare hosted many community workshops including Professional

development held at Lotteries House, George Street and Civic Centre. Workshops have included;

Development Solutions; Safe Schools, Parliament Education office of WA, Risk Frontiers Focus group,

Protective Behaviours; Behaviour Tonics, Resilient Youth Australia

· Escare completed the current partnership with the Rural Clinical School of WA student, Oliver Johnson

who worked with young indigenous people and measuring quality of life outcomes. This was first for

Escare and Dardy Grub project has gone from strength to strength.

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3 Best Practice

Escare Incorporated operates a clear and consistent methodology

delivering a wealth of services, responsive to emergent issues, which are

appropriately communicated to all parties.

Escare continues to engage Dry Kirkness and Associates who travel

from Perth to undertake our annual audit. Thanks to Barry John

Rothman and other Associates who have supported Escare over

the years.

As part of the audit process Escare completes a Specific Topics Questionnaire to help facilitate compliance

with all the requirements of auditing standards. Escare is committed to a robust audit that assists the

organisation to continually improve each year.

Escare has continuous improvement policy and

team members are encouraged at team meetings

or in supervision or individually to identify where

activities can be improved. In a busy organisation

there are often ways to change the way we do

things to support communication and each other.

This year we participated in a Health Check which

Linkwest provided and outcomes from this process

are part of our continual improvement practices.

Escare continues to increase awareness of it programs via our website, e-newsletter, publications and update

of the Community Resource Booklet, Esperance Kids Stuff booklet and App, advertising and Facebook sites.

We have over 300 likes, with an average of 500 views a month on our Facebook page. Escare promotes

activities via newspaper articles as well as on local ABC and commercial radio.

Escare’s Financial Counsellor has seen over 400 people and looks for new ways to engage with the community

and connects via Esperance Court (people have unpaid fines) Max Employment, Teen Challenge, Hope

Community, BOICO and Esperance Care services.

4 Community Education

Escare Incorporated provides capacity building education to the community which includes targeting specific groups,

trends and needs, as identified through collaboration with members of the community.

Our Community Development Officer, Natalie Symonds, has led the way in bringing WA Child Safety Services’

Protective Behaviours program regularly to the Esperance Community. Natalie delivers the program as well as

organising PBWA to present to the community. This has resulted in cyber safety workshops for adults as well

as young people as well as Protective behaviour workshops for adults.

With growing concerns in the community about social media; the Cyber Bullying workshops have had

increased attendance by 50%. Protective Behaviours workshops have continued to be taken up and word of

mouth ensures these workshops are well attended. A gap in the provision of such workshops presented by

professionals to assist in providing parents/carers, professionals and community members with an

opportunity to gain awareness and education on a range of topics was identified in Esperance, particularly via

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the Esperance Psychology collection of data from young people in 2016. In collaboration with Esperance

Psychology and other community stakeholders, Escare has taken on the role in filling this gap

Escare in the Community: engages with community members through interagency meetings; Early Years

Network, community consultation (Escare has been involved in 5 broad community consults) as well as

speaking with citizens at community events such as the ‘Nulsen in November’ event, NAIDOC week Early Years

event and community events such as ‘Take the Plunge’. We participated in the Christmas Pageant, with sports

wheelchairs and all! We invite feedback on our services via surveys and Facebook comments and likes. We

also love to chat to people attending our services and ask what they see as emerging issues. Escare is a

member of key PEAK bodies and we engage in state and national consultations and network meetings where

possible. We have engaged with Lifespan, playing a key role in the development of this group in Esperance.

Other liaisons and activities include Festival of the Wind; 3 on 3 basketball, Youth week; 3 on 3 basketball,

Nulsen in November, NAIDOC week, Aboriginal Children Day, Children Week Nature Play, International

Women’s Day Morning Tea, Mental health week; take the plunge, International Day of persons with a

disability, Christmas presents and hampers.

The Financial Counselling service has delivered

community education to the Clontarf Academy, Skill

Hire, Esperance High school and Escare’s Women

Learning for Life group.

5 Inclusiveness

Escare Incorporated ensures the inclusion of marginalised community members in all programs offered and responds

positively to the specific needs of these groups.

The Ecare Youth service has partnered with the

Esperance Senior High School and Clontarf Football

Academy to deliver health check days for young

Indigenous women and men. The Financial Counsellor

provided workshops for Clontarf.

Women Learning For Life Group led by Megs Sims,

continues to offer innovative programs, recently

partnering with Centrecare. Groups have included

Yarning Dolls, Woodwork at Bunnings with Men in

Sheds and cooking and budgeting skills. Over 60

women have particpated.

The Dardy Grub Cooking Club program is focused on

raising the capacity for the target group to become more food literate and have the skills to prepare and

deliver a home cooked family meal that can be shared by the family on a regular basis. The success of the

program will be measured by improvements in ‘Quality of Life’ measurements of the participants. Over 50

Young people have participated regularly in the program so far.

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Escare partners with the local Aboriginal community in

Closing the Gap events as well as NAIDOC week

activities. Escare has acknowledges that reconciliation

action plans require engagement with Aboriginal

community. We already have meaningful

conversations about building capacity for the

Aboriginal community including around Arts and

Parenting. Escare is mindful of not putting pressure on

people to be “consulted”. Escare delivers RAP focus

areas. Escare are delighted to have employed in the

past 12 months Colleen Frost as a casual worker and

Jennell Reynolds as Aboriginal Arts Coordinator.

The One and All Inclusion Project (established 2012) focuses on providing community based opportunities for

inclusive participation. New MOUs with Esperance Shire and BOICO ensure the programs sustainability into

the future. The program, with support from a local steering group, is highly successful in attracting both

participants and other community groups to each of the sessions. On average there was 333 attendances

occurred at each of the last four holiday programs (with 10% people with a disability, and 4% Indigenous

participation). The benefits of participation are mutual in the respect gained by all for persons with a disability

as well as volunteers and participants learning welcoming, inclusive skills.

The Caring 4 Carers Project (2017) continues it work to provide people living with disability and care service

providers respite options. Solutions to these issues would ideally incorporate community involvement and

opportunities for the person with a disability. The project also sought solutions which were innovative, low

cost and sustainable. Escare has built on these, however with the unknown factor of NDIS this project will not

be funded in the future. We hope outcomes achieved can be maintained as respite option. These include Host

Families, identified accommodation at boarding facilities, high care skills register and clubs hosting persons

with a disability.

The Esperance Kids Fun Day Out is an opportunity for local children to experience a large event that is usually

only available in the big cities. We are under way for planning the 2018 event scheduled to be held on 8 April.

Escare has a Disability Access Inclusion Plan that is reviewed annually. DAIPs assist public authorities to plan

and implement improvements to access and inclusion across seven outcome areas, with respect to services

and events, buildings and facilities, information, quality of service, complaints, consultation processes and

employment. These plans benefit people with disability, the elderly, young parents and people from culturally

and linguistically diverse background

6 Service Excellence

Escare Inc. is acknowledged in the community as a reputable, responsible organisation and preferred employer, with

the capacity to achieve outcomes with our capable, informed and united team of workers.

Escare Inc. is acknowledged in the community as a reputable, responsible organisation and preferred

employer, with the capacity to achieve outcomes with our capable, informed and united team of workers.

An extensive exercise was conducted to revise Escare Incorporated’s Constitution to reflect the organisations

Strategic direction, modern practices and to align with changes to the Associations Incorporation Act 2015.

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Team members undertake professional development regularly identified in their performance management

/supervision sessions. Escare has a number of training sessions that are bench marked: mental health training;

communication training, trauma lens, cross cultural and child safety practices. Escare has long term employees

with a small turnover rate and team appreciate family flexible workplace practices.

The Escare team attend regular team meeting as well as team building activities such as Monday morning

walk/fitness, annual dinner with remote worker Karen Collins, Christmas staff and Board gathering and last

year the Christmas pageant.

The three core funded programs, Financial Counselling, Family & Community program and Youth service, have

each undertaken a successful service review with positive feedback from funding bodies.

Escare is a member of WACOSS; Linkwest; FCAWA; YACWA; Community employer’s groups, Child Care

Alliance; SNAIC. These memberships ensure we are up to date with recent trends policies and laws.

The Escare and Esperance Community Arts partnership has fostered strong relationships with non-Aboriginal

and Aboriginal artists in the region and has resulted in employment and greater understanding of Aboriginal

Issues in the Esperance community. This has been done in collaboration and consultation with the Esperance

Tjaltjraak Native Title Aboriginal Corporation and Esperance Saltwater Family group.

Resources and Financial Management

Escare Incorporated receives funding from a number of sources including:

· Department of Communities: Youth, Financial Counselling and Family & Community Services; Caring

4 Carers project.

· Australian Government Department of Human Services under the Community Support Program.

With sound and prudent financial management Escare Incorporated continues to provide valuable support

and services to the Esperance community, whilst ensuring the sustainability and stability of the organisation.

Staff are to be highly commended for delivering high quality programs while being contentious about project

spend and keeping within budget.

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Finances:

Escare Board 2016/17

Shane Tobin (Chairperson) Sharon Henning, Val Scheer, Anne McAleese,

Vicki Griffiths, Ian Newman, Joanne Halliday.

Volunteer and Make a Difference! ü Volunteer for One and All Inclusion activities

ü Volunteer to be on the Escare Board

Strategic Plan

http://www.escare.org.au/images/downloads/2015/StratPlan_brochure.pdf

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Phone: 08 90713110

Email: [email protected]

Web: www.escare.org.au

Facebook: Escare Incorporated

Esperance Lotteries House

Forrest St

(P O Box 850)

Esperance WA

6450

escare incorporated annual report 2016 -2017 - escare.org.au · 1 escare incorporated : annual...

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