About Us
Welcome to the Communities for Children - Family Support Program (Kingston, Loganlea, & Waterford West) Website.
This new family support program follows on from the original Communities for Children Initiative with a few small changes. The biggest change for us is that we now provide services and resources for children 0-12 years and their families.
We hope that you will enjoy exploring the following pages where you will find information on the services we provide to children, families and practitioners, as well as some of the resources and training available. You will also find a monthly calendar to let you know what’s happening when and where.
The Family Support Program, funded by the Department of Family and Community Services, Housing and Indigenous Affairs, will build on the successes of the Communities for Children Initiative. The Family Support Program CfC will help bring together programs to help establish co-ordinated services that more effectively support children aged 0-12 and their families. The program will transition over the next two years to full implementation of the Family Support Program in year three.
The strategy supports early intervention and prevention approaches, with a particular emphasis on children aged birth to twelve and resources that can be used to achieve better outcomes for children and their families and to help families and communities deal with issues before they become serious. It recognises that families and communities all have strengths that can be built on to respond to issues and create opportunities.
It supports approaches that give individuals, families and children opportunities to be actively engaged in community life through activities such as education, training, volunteering, caring for others, social activity and paid work.
The Family Support/Communities for Children Program is about community involvement and ownership, and giving community organisations a chance to think about the local issues and how they can best be addressed. It is also about building partnerships between all spheres of government, community organisations and business to provide easier to access to a comprehensive range of services that will help our children and our families have better outcomes. The program will work to the ‘No Wrong Door’ policy using referral pathways to support and streamline services for children and families.
The key focus of the strategy is to provide better chances for children and their families, and to build stronger communities that allow these children and their families to flourish and achieve their potential.
In each site, ‘Communities for Children’ Family Support Program will address the needs of young children 0-12 years, and their families to give the children the best possible start in life - directly assisting young children, but also influencing the contexts within which they live; their family, their community and the broader social, economic and cultural environments.
The focus of Communities for Children Family Support Program will be improving on child outcomes and well being across the broad domains of heath, learning, social inclusion and development and support for families and parents.
Projects should aim to build partnerships between key stakeholders including community leaders and members, family and community service providers, business and other service providers and levels of government, to build a common goal of improved outcomes for children.
The funded NGOs will act as “facilitating Partners” within each Community for Children Family Support Site they will manage and facilitate the project, working in collaboration with the community and agency stakeholders to develop and implement the Community Strategic Plan, and Service Delivery Plan tailored to the particular needs of the community.
