Berry Street Web Docs Annual Report 2014 | Page 26

The power of perseverance Jacky’s story A couple of months ago, Jacky successfully moved from her lead tenant home to private rental closer to her fulltime job. We first got to know Jacky when she was nine months old, removed from her family and went into foster care. After several years, her foster care placement broke down and she spent two years in residential care before we helped her to start moving to independence. After 18 months, with the support of her lead tenant and our Berry Street case manager, Jacky was ready to move out on her own. We will continue to provide support to Jacky for at least 12 months through our leaving care pilot program. BERRY STREET ANNUAL REPORT 2014 Therapeutic 26 Every year we are learning more about the impact of trauma on the child’s developing brain and how we can help the child recover. This year, we celebrated 10 years of Take Two, a unique partnership funded by the Department of Human Services with La Trobe University, Mindful, the Victorian Aboriginal Child Care Agency, 13 community service organisations and seven Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations. The continuity provided by the 15 staff who joined us in 2003 has given Take Two such a strong foundation on which to build. ^^Working intensively with 823 children and young people and another 275 young people through the Bushfire Youth Counselling program ^^Providing training and professional development to the sector on: Calmer Classrooms; kinship care; trauma and attachment; ‘With Car e’ for all residential staff in Victoria; ‘Fostering Hope’; creative healing and recovery; introduction to high risk infant mental health; person-centred training for young people with a disability; and partnering for the Graduate Diploma in Child and Family Practice Leadership ^^Expanding our partnerships with Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations, especially through a new coordinating role in Aboriginal Therapeutic Home Based Care Our 81 clinicians located across Victoria work one on one with children and young people, help their parents and carers to understand what they need to do, contribute to care teams and provide consultation and continuously look at what needs to be done to make the system work better for these children. All of these children have been referred by Child Protection as their highest priority. We believe most of the children in Child Protection would benefit from this approach. Although each young person has their unique strengths and needs, the first step is always establishing a relationship and earning their trust Becoming independent Kaley’s Story Kaley, a 19 year old Aboriginal woman, was living with her grandmother and partner when the Police became involved. There were grave concerns about both of their safety as the partner had threatened to kill both of them. Working closely with the Police, the partner was eventually remanded for a number of offences. This gave Kaley the break she needed to understand how destructive the relationship with her partner was. Fifteen months later, Kaley has moved back with her grandmother, is living without violence, is loving studying business management, is planning to get her driver’s licence and car and can now see a real future for herself.