The Department for Child Protection recently supported approximately 30 young people with a care experience to attend the CREATE ‘Voices in Action’ conference at the Melbourne Zoo, along with a number of department staff and carers.
More than 500 young people, carers and sector professionals from across the country attended to connect and discuss challenges facing the care sector, and collaborated to create real world solutions. Attendees heard from inspirational speakers and international guests, including New Zealander Tracie Shipton, mother, foster mother, social worker and Chief Executive of Voyce-Whakarongo Mai.
The 2019 conference had a strong focus on 3 three key issues identified by children and young people with a care experience as fundamental to improving the care system:
- transitioning from care
- participation and decision-making
- complaints and record keeping.
The young people who attended said that they enjoyed the zoo venue, and valued hearing how people who had been in care were promoting the voices of other young people. They particularly liked hearing from guest speaker, Callum Lynch from Who Cares? Scotland on day 2 of the conference. You can read more about Callum’s story in this BBC news article.