Page 1425 - Week 04 - Thursday, 5 May 2022

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promoting health and wellbeing for early childhood (0-5 years) and to inform local intervention efforts focused on the community and broader systems level.

Further information on the study is available here: https://www.canberra.edu.au/research/institutes/health-research-institute/a-good-start-in-life-for-young-children.

(2) (a) In 2015, several organisations operating primarily in the West Belconnen area came together to establish the West Belconnen Local Services Network (WBLSN) as part of the Better Services initiative under the ACT Government’s Human Services Blueprint. WBLSN was focused on improving the local community’s opportunities and activities, so that the community would be stronger and more connected.

One area of action for WBLSN was early childhood. This led A Village for Every Child to exclusively focus on early intervention and early childhood as there was opportunity to make the biggest impact over the longest time.

In 2017, UnitingCare Kippax received funding from the ACT Education Directorate to establish the Backbone Team needed to implement a Collective Impact approach to the early childhood system in the Belconnen area. Work was then done to establish the foundations of Village, including developing supporting theory and documentation as well as community consultation to inform the projects.

Since July 2019, the initiative has been administered through a Service Deed with the Education Directorate.

Further information on A Village for Every Child is available here: https://vfec.canberra.host/.

(b) The total funding for the initiative is $1,852,000 for the life of the Service Deed.

Parent outcomes	Community outcomes	Sector outcomes
Increased knowledge of child development	Increased information about parenting and support opportunities	Increased connection between services, resulting in smoother transitions between them
Increased parenting skills and stronger attachment	Increased input to design and implementation of Initiative, groups and opportunities	Better (more equitable) distribution of groups and opportunities and more effective access to them
Increased engagement in groups supporting parenting	Developing community awareness of the importance of community in a child’s development	Increased knowledge of effective groups, opportunities and methods leading to improved quality of service provision

(d) Families access services through their contact with the range of organisations part of, or connected to, the Village group.

(e) Families are not referred into the Village project, because it is a collective of service delivery partners. Families are referred into the service providers that are part of, or connected to, the Village project.

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