The role of the Family Wellbeing Empowerment Program as a framework for engaging communities and bui

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The role of the Family Wellbeing Empowerment
Program as a framework for engaging communities
and building Aboriginal leadership and
organisational capacity

• Yvonne Cadet James and Janya McCalman
• School of indigenous Australian Studies,
• James Cook University

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Empowerment Research Project

• Research partners
• University of Queensland
• Apunipima Cape York Health Council
• Gurriny Yealamucka Health Service Aboriginal Corp
• Tangentyere Council Alice Springs
• Yaba Bimbie Mens Group
• MaDdaimba-Balas Mens Group
• Qld Department of Communities and Child Safety
• Centre for Rural Remote Mental Health
  Queensland
• Queensland Health
• Kowanyama Aboriginal Council
• Hope Vale Queensland Health
• Wuchopperen Health Service
• RFDS
• Multi disciplinary team

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Empowerment Research Project

• Aim
• To explore the role and contribution that
  concepts of empowerment and control can make
  towards better understanding and addressing the
  social determinants of Indigenous Australian
  health and wellbeing

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What is empowerment?

• A social action process that promotes
  participation of people, organisations and
  communities towards the goals of increased
  individual and community control, political
  efficacy, improved quality of community life, and
  social justice (Wallerstein 1992).

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Indigenous descriptions

• Healing coming to terms with the past
  present situation, dealing with the pain
• Gaining Control
• Becoming Strong
• Finding Your Voice, Participating in Change
• Working Together for a Strong Community

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Why empowerment?

• Indigenous people of Australia have experienced
  severe and systematic disempowerment with
  devastating health and social impacts.
• The evidence-base now exists Interventions that
  empower socially excluded populations across
  psychological, organizational and community
  levels have achieved improved health outcomes and
  quality of life of disadvantaged groups.
• (From WHO Health Evidence Report on Effectiveness
  of Empowerment to Improve Health, Wallerstein,
  2006)

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The research program

• Multi-level empowerment framework
• Participatory action research
• Employment of community- based researchers
• Phased approach to evaluation series of reports
  and papers.

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Family Wellbeing Program

• Developed by Indigenous people
• Holistic approach - material, emotional, mental
  and spiritual wellbeing leads to self-empowerment
  and gives people communication skills, conflict
  resolution and other qualities to take greater
  control and responsibility and bring about
  personal, family, organisational and community
  level change
• Can be taken up differently in different
  communities according to local strength, interest
  and capacity.

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Start Up Session

• What is Family Wellbeing about?
• Bringing people together, building trust and
  mutual respect
• Building support within families and communities
• Finding our strength and identity
• Starting with ourselves
• Learning ways to heal the past and support others
  to do the same
• Seeds of change and the ripple effect
• Gaining new understanding about how to deal with
  the challenges and life
• Building a vision for the future
• We are all the teachers and we are all the
  learners

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Family Wellbeing Program

• Mixed adult groups
• Mens groups
• Womens groups
• School children
• Organisational employees
• Men in prison

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TOPICS LIST

• Start Up Session Group Agreement
• Qualities of a Leader / Counsellor Basic Human
  Qualities
• Basic Human Needs
• Understanding Relationships Relationship
  Triangles
• Conflict Resolution
• Understanding Emotions Dealing with and
  Expressing Emotions
• Understanding Crisis
• Understanding Beliefs and Attitudes
• Personal Group Work Project Plan Making
  Personal Community Changes
• Bringing It All Together Evaluation

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Outcomes

• Personal and Family
• Increased reflective skills
• Understanding of self and situation
• Achievement of personal stability
• Development of intellectual curiosity
• Development of hope and confidence
• Personal healing
• Learning to control destructive emotions
• Improved relationships within the family
• Providing support to family
• Better care and support of children
• Stronger in saying No
• Employment
• Engagement in broader change processes

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Outcomes

• Organisational
• Work better as a team member
• Better able to deal with work issues, conflict
• Providing support to others
• Looked at the bigger picture
• Got another job
• Incorporated FWB principles in work place which
  affected how organisation worked
• Consensus about group identity and values
• Community perceptions
• Strengthened workforce capacity.

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Outcomes

• Structural Level
• Advocacy outcomes eg housing, vacation school
  care
• Incorporated into school curricula
• Development of community controlled health
  service
• Cultural activities
• Programs sustained over 10 years
• Funding support
• Contributions to initiatives in other settings.

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Emerging Findings

• Some degree of gaining understanding of self and
  situation is required for people to become
  engaged in change processes
• Achieving personal stability is required for
  changes to become sustainable
• Value of PAR/qualitative research in relation to
  social determinants
• Concepts of empowerment and control need to be
  taken more seriously
• Empowerment and control critical in effective
  prevention and management of chronic conditions
  and diseases
• Multi-level change experiences/strategies in
  social reform, education, health promotion, and
  clinical settings eg. welfare reform processes,
  education, mental health, social health programs,
  suicide prevention, substance abuse, chronic
  disease.

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Where to from here?

• Continue to support developments and build
  evidence base for empowerment based
  interventions
• Quantitative tools to strengthen research methods
  and explore cost effectiveness of empowerment
  interventions
• Ongoing support for groups and communities as
  they see fit
• Collaborative projects with others with similar
  interests.

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Qualities of a Leader / Counsellor Basic Human
Qualities

• Who in your family or community do you look up
  to? Give reasons why you picked this person.

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Qualities of a Leader / Counsellor Basic Human
Qualities

• Who do you admire as a leader or a person you
  look up to in Australia? Give reasons why you
  picked this person.

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Qualities of a Leader / CounsellorBasic Human
Qualities

• What type of leader do you consider yourself to
  be? Give your reasons.

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Personal inner qualities

• Step one what Inner Qualities do I value the
  most?
• On your own take a look at the Inner Qualities
  list. From that list select 10 inner qualities
  that are most important to you and reflects your
  leadership qualities.

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Step two

• Now that you have identified ten, image you are
  only permitted to have 5 inner qualities. Which 5
  inner qualities would you surrender? Cross them
  off the list.
• Now image you are only permitted to have 4 inner
  qualities, now cross another one off the list.
• Now cross off another, this will bring your list
  down to 3.
• Cross off another to bring the list to 2
• Finally, cross off one of the 2 inner qualities.
  Which is the one inner quality on the list that
  you most care about?

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Step three

• Take a look at the top three inner qualities on
  your list, and think about these things
• What do these inner qualities mean specifically?
• Which were the hardest choices you had to make in
  removing inner qualities?
• Which were the easiest choices to make when
  eliminating inner qualities?

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Step four

• Discuss with the person beside you or pair off
  and discuss amongst yourself what your final
  remaining inner quality was and why you made this
  choice.
• Group discussion with in the larger group (not
  compulsory) share your choice and why it was
  chosen.