Essential disability program SAILSS on
Moe Turaga, Social Inclusion Program Coordinator at the Tom Quinn Community Centre. (Photo supplied by Moe Turaga)
A groundbreaking social inclusion program is relaunching at the Tom Quinn Centre in Bundaberg, thanks to funding from The Salvation Army Individual Lifestyle Support Service (SAILSS).
In mid-2012, all funding to the program was frozen, then permanently cut, due to state government budget measures. This meant temporary closure of an important social program, which helps young people aged 15 to 17 with mild-to-moderate disabilities, such as autism spectrum disorders, become work-ready.
The service includes accredited training or work experience in areas such as horticulture, hospitality, woodwork and construction. It also helps develop general employment skills and offers support with literacy and numeracy, social skills, and SAGALA (Salvation Army Guards and Legion ).
Parental support, respite, mentoring and chaplaincy are also offered.
Tom Osborne manages the Tom Quinn Centre, which runs a general range of accredited training and work experience programs for around 80-90 people each day.
“We’ve always had disabled clients coming to the centre with carers to use the pool, or do some woodwork. We noticed a large number of young people with milder disabilities were just getting dropped here to hang around by parents at their wits end,” Tom says.
“Our facilitator, Jody Schneider, who was studying disability services, saw a huge gap in services for these young people, and we created the social inclusion program.”
Many young people from the program were disengaging from school and socially isolated when they first started. They are now doing certificates they didn’t think possible.
A significant number of them have also gone on to find local employment.
Program co-ordinator Moe Turaga says that funding is in place to support at least 20-30 young people this year, in partnership with local schools. Participants spend two days of every school week on site at the centre.
Moe believes that the service is essential to the young people who were seriously threatened with “falling through the gaps.”
“You are dealing with high-functioning skills, so they don’t fit normal disability programs, but they still have a disability. They are in no-man’s land – they can’t get funding, and can’t easily get fulltime employment,” he says.
“These kids struggle at school, then start acting out. The only way the school can deal with it is to send them home. For the kids it can be a treat to be sent home because school is a stress. They’re not learning anything and falling further behind.”
According to Moe, the centre is now in talks with SAILSS, a Brisbane-based Salvation Army disability support service which works to provide greater independence and quality for people with an intellectual disability. Together, they hope to expand the range of disability support programs the Tom Quinn Centre will offer.
Comments
Great work Tom and your team. It's great to see you are still doing good work in what must be difficult circumstances.
John
Thank You SAILSS
Thank you so much for putting this message out there!Parvathy's is a hard-hitting, yet absolutely necessary talk at the intersection of sexuality and disability.