April 2004

Conference is taking power to the people

A national conference in Melbourne aims to further an agenda of empowerment for individuals and families in the fields of health, disability, mental health, aged care, early childhood development, youth, schools, special education, employment and training, personal and family supports and community development.

The Empowering Individuals and Families in the Human Services conference will be held on May 27 and 28.

Hosted by Social Enterprise Partnerships, it will explore projects, models and strategies which:

• Tackle the fragmentation in human services across program, provider, disciplinary and jurisdictional boundaries;

• Pool funding streams from various programs in person-centred practice;

• Develop person-centred information systems across disciplines and programs;

• Introduce new forms of information provision about service availability, quality and pricing;

• Develop new governance models for empowerment;

• Introduce new learning models for empowerment.

It will also announce the winners of the inaugural Empowerment Awards:

• Most Promising New Initiative—for the most promising new initiative or project begun in the last 18 months which empowers individuals and families in the human services;

• Best Support Role—for an individual or organisation in any setting (government, service provider,support agency, philanthropy, corporate) which has supported the empowerment agenda in the human services in an outstanding way.

• Courage and Resilience Award—for an individual who has shown outstanding courage and resilience over a long period of time in working to empower individuals and families in the human services.

Nomination deadline is April 16.

• For further information contact Social Enterprise Partnerships Executive Director Vern Hughes on 9326 4481 or at hotham@sub.net.au.