“I’m a Gumbaynggirr woman from Nambucca Heads but I’ve lived on the Tweed for most of my life so I do call Bundjalung country my home. I’m the second eldest of five siblings. My mum is Aboriginal and my dad is white Australian.
I’ve been a community service worker for about 11 years. I started in schools doing a lot of mentoring programs for sport. My parents being foster parents themselves, I’ve always grown up with foster children in our home. It seemed like a natural progression for me to then give back. My role with Life Without Barriers is the Aboriginal Case Manager so I predominately work with Aboriginal kids and families. I like to pride myself on working with families to restore back to kin so I guess thats one of the feathers in my cap. A lot of my children still remain in care however they are in a supported kinship place or a supported home where you still have an agency in the background.
As of the 1st July there has been a massive policy shift within community service so for the next five years and hopefully forever FACS and all the NGO providers are working to do a lot more prevention and intervention to keep families together so right now we are having a big drive to recruit all walks of life to give back to community and help our kids. I find that we are a really large national organisation but locally we are not as known.
The last statistics showed that there were about 35,000 kids needing foster care in NSW alone and these figures are increasing particularly for Aboriginal kids. What we are seeing is another stolen generation of a high influx of kids coming into care and not going home. That’s why we need carers. People can reach us at our website. We are based at Alstonville and cover from Tweed to Grafton and as far inland as Tenterfield.”
“The small moments are often the most rewarding and the most significant, like seeing a child relax enough to share a joke with you. If you are lucky enough to see a child you care for run for the first time, or to hear them speak their first word, it’s something you will cherish always.” Donna.
If you think you would like to be a Foster Carer contact Life without Barriers at www.lwb.org.au
I’ve been a community service worker for about 11 years. I started in schools doing a lot of mentoring programs for sport. My parents being foster parents themselves, I’ve always grown up with foster children in our home. It seemed like a natural progression for me to then give back. My role with Life Without Barriers is the Aboriginal Case Manager so I predominately work with Aboriginal kids and families. I like to pride myself on working with families to restore back to kin so I guess thats one of the feathers in my cap. A lot of my children still remain in care however they are in a supported kinship place or a supported home where you still have an agency in the background.
As of the 1st July there has been a massive policy shift within community service so for the next five years and hopefully forever FACS and all the NGO providers are working to do a lot more prevention and intervention to keep families together so right now we are having a big drive to recruit all walks of life to give back to community and help our kids. I find that we are a really large national organisation but locally we are not as known.
The last statistics showed that there were about 35,000 kids needing foster care in NSW alone and these figures are increasing particularly for Aboriginal kids. What we are seeing is another stolen generation of a high influx of kids coming into care and not going home. That’s why we need carers. People can reach us at our website. We are based at Alstonville and cover from Tweed to Grafton and as far inland as Tenterfield.”
“The small moments are often the most rewarding and the most significant, like seeing a child relax enough to share a joke with you. If you are lucky enough to see a child you care for run for the first time, or to hear them speak their first word, it’s something you will cherish always.” Donna.
If you think you would like to be a Foster Carer contact Life without Barriers at www.lwb.org.au