A project of Homestay Management Pty Ltd

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A project of Homestay Management Pty Ltd
Working together to build complete homestay
solutions. TAFE Directors Australia Conference
September 2008
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What is hot-bedding?

• Hot-bedding is where one or more students share a
  bed for sleeping in shifts
• Last week, Consumer Affairs Victoria told us of
  27 students living in one room and
  'hot-bedding!!!!

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NATIONWIDE

• Crisis re shortage of rental accommodation
• Rapid rising prices of rental accommodation
• There are a growing number of problems
• Perhaps the biggest crisis, is that not enough of
  us are focussed on solving the problem

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Examples

• Yesterday I was told of a student who is sleeping
  in his car and using the shower facilities at the
  local swimming pool
• He parks overnight in the driveway of a friend
  who's renting
• He had wanted to stay in the house but the
  students are scared the landlord might find out

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Welcome to Australia !

• Another student was given information and the
  address of his host family
• When he was delivered to that home, he was told
  by the host, 'You're not staying with me' and was
  directed to another home
• The new host mother already had ten students and
  he was now her eleventh
• The institution only found out about it when the
  student came to ask if this was 'normal' in
  Australia

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Threes a crowd!

• Many families host more than three students and
  tell us 'The Homestay provider/supervisor said it
  was an emergency and that it would be OK' 
• This contravenes Regulations and raises issues re
  insurance liability as the home has technically
  become a boarding house

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Saving Private Homestay

• Families are generally not
• being oriented
• made to sign an agreement
• being formally trained and assessed
• Being tracked
• This leads to a variety of avoidable behaviour
  and issues
• Please find out what your Homestay Host training
  process is!

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Host standards in Homestay

• All Hosts think they have perfectly suitable
  arrangements. For example
• attic room with no door, only a curtain
• bungalow with no ablution facilities
• a bed in the dining room, shielding it with a
  huge dining table and chairs
• host mother converting the open plan dining-room
  into her own bedroom, thus making three bedrooms
  available for students

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Confirmation of Appropriate Accommodation and
Welfare----CAAW

• We have heard that
• Once Education Fees are paid some education
  providers are leaving it up to the U/18 student
  to comply with this DIMA requirement and
  Institution obligation
• If an issue arises it is then followed up
• This is a big concern

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Australian Homestay Network

• AHN is a network of
• individuals
• institutions
• organisations
• agents
• and groups
• associated with ensuring the provision of
  quality Homestay services in Australia

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Compliance Quality/Best Practice

• AHN has a quality audit trail for any Department
  reviews relating to National Code/ESOS
• Standard 6 - Student support services
• AHN offers a framework for ensuring that the
  accommodation for a student under 18 is
  appropriate
• Standard 5 - Younger students CAAW
• AHN has critical incident protocols in place with
  clear communication lines with qualified
  professionals
• Standard 6 (6.4)

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Homestay Industry Issues (May 07)

• Need for nationally accredited processes,
  benchmarks and standards
• Poor systems / processes
• Lack of resources for supervisors of Homestay
• Lack of support staff
• Supply of trained hosts to deal with these issues
• Need to educate agents
• AHN aims to address and resolve these issues

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Australian Homestay Network

• WE ARE A FAST GROWING NETWORK
• WE WANT EVERY INSTITUTION IN AUSTRALIA TO JOIN US
  
• WE WANT YOU TO HAVE FREE ACCESS TO OUR DATA
• WE WANT YOU TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONTINUOUS
  IMPROVEMENT OF HOMESTAY
• WE ALL WANT TO BE PROUD OF THE AUSTRALIAN
  HOMESTAY EXPERIENCE

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A project of Homestay Management Pty Ltd
Working together to build complete Homestay
solutions TAFE Directors Australia Conference
September 2008
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Free for Institutions to join

• David Bycroft
• 0408 623 790
• dbycroft_at_homestaynetwork.org
• Anthony Fleming
• 0415 855 232
• afleming_at_homestaynetwork.org

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A project of Homestay Management Pty Ltd
Working together to build complete homestay
solutions.