Evaluation of the self directed support pilot for children and young adults with a physical disability

Disability and Community Care Services, Department of Communities commissioned an evaluation of the outcomes, process and costs of the Self Directed Support pilot by a research team led by the Social Policy Research Centre.  This final report provides findings about the outcomes for participants and their families, implementation of the pilot, the process and cost analysis. It also draws together implications for future development of similar programs.  The Self Directed Support pilot had two key objectives: community inclusion and the empowerment of service users to make their own choices about their support (self direction). Self directed support enabled individuals, their families and their other informal supporters to identify their needs, lifestyles and aspirations, and set personal goals. By giving people with disabilities access to planning and case management, and control over their allocated funding, the program allowed them to be their own agents of change (Department of Communities, 2010: 7). The Queensland Department of Communities selected two service providers from a negotiated tender process to implement the Self Directed Support pilot to two groups of people with disability – children and their families, and young adults. One was the Sunshine Coast Children’s Therapy Centre (SCCTC), which supports young children (0-6 years) with physical disabilities and their family carers and significant other informal supporters. SCCTC had one full-time service coordinator. The second was the Acquired Brain Injury Outreach Service (ABIOS) in Brisbane, which supports young adults (20-35 years) with acquired brain injury and physical disability. Existing ABIOS case managers (ten) incorporated the self directed support function into their other responsibilities. The two provider

Safe at school?

This recent research project investigated the safety of students with cognitive disability in and around school. Evidence shows that children and young people with cognitive disability experience violence, abuse, and neglect at rates considerably higher than their peers. Despite this, little is known about the perspectives of students with cognitive disability on what helps and hinders them in feeling and being safe at school. Qualitative research focused on gathering the perspectives of 27 students and families, and other key supporters such as teachers, disability, and child protection workers about personal safety and harm in and around school, together with their views on how harm might be avoided or better responded to. A significant discord emerged between students’ experiences of harm, the responses provided by education providers, and the systemic structures they found available to support resolution of abuse. The rights of students with cognitive disability to be safe at school were in many cases not upheld. Strengthening the implementation of the legal and human rights of students with cognitive disability in school settings is reliant in large part on the efforts and collaboration of multiple stakeholders, requiring sustained commitment to change at personal, school and systemic levels

Developing site-specific guidelines for orchard soils based on bioaccessibility – Can it be done?

Horticultural land within the periurban fringe of NZ towns and cities increasingly is being developed for residential subdivision. Recent surveys have shown that concentrations of As, Cd, Cu, Pb, and ΣDDT (sum of DDT and its degradation products DDE and DDD) in such soils can exceed criteria protective of human health.¹ Soil ingestion is a key exposure pathway for non-volatile contaminants in soil. Currently in NZ, site-specific risk assessments and the derivation of soil guidelines protective of human health assume that all of the contaminant present in the soil is available for uptake and absorption by the human gastrointestinal tract. This assumption can overestimate health risks and has implications for the remediation of contaminated sites.² In comparison, the bioavailability of contaminants is considered when estimating exposure via dermal absorption and by ingestion of home-grown produce.³ Dermal absorption factors and plant uptake factors are included in the calculations for estimating exposures via these routes

Supported accommodation evaluation framework (SAEF) guide

High hopes for the NDIS are that people with disability will be able to live as independently as they choose, with the housing of their choice, and with the paid support that suits their preferences and life goals. Research conducted by the Social Policy Research Centre for the NSW government about disability housing support that is like the NDIS found that most people did achieve some positive outcomes. Least change was evident in people’s interpersonal relationships and employment, and some people did not live in housing that met their needs.&nbsp

Food & identity

The output is a creative project that explores the concept of food identity as an important cultural and social construct through photography. Research Process: The project is inspired by mainstream images of food in cookbooks, lifestyle magazines and on social media, particularly visual depictions of idealised lifestyles which conjures shared social fantasies, perpetuated by mainstream images and our own internalisation of them. This project spanned a number of years, producing an extensive final body of work. Participants in this project were sourced through word-of-mouth, social media, and an online questionnaire. Final photographs were produced though a collaborative process which involved discussion and negotiation between the subject and photographer. Research Insights: The link between identity and food is cyclical. Food choice is informed by our time/space coordinates – age, nationality, regionality - and our cultural identity, including race, religion, and social class. We use food as an evolving representation of ideological and political identity, constructing ourselves through moral and ethical decisions. Identity can be established through choices such as meat free, dairy free, plant based, low fat, low carb, high protein, high welfare, big brand, small independent, local, international, familiar or exotic. Our relationship with food is complex; passionately held beliefs and values are often expressed through food choice. Food can possess emotional significance and invoke a range of human emotions from gratitude to guilt, from tearful reminiscences to joyful nostalgia. Intimate details and memories from one’s own life are often bound up in perpetuating food practices and rituals. Dissemination: The output was exhibited at Food & Identity, Food Photographer of the Year Finalists Exhibition (2015 & 2017),Mall Galleries, London. May 2015 and April 2017. Food & Identity, Dye House Gallery, Bradford. September 2015. Food & Identity, Bradford Brewery. July 2015. Food & Identity, Hothouse Conference. 21 March 2015

Cookbook anxiety

The output is a creative project that responds to the Cookery Collection, one of the special collections in Leeds University library, which contains printed and archival material relating to food and cooking that dates from the late 15th Century until the present day. Research process: The project responds to selected cookbooks and printed material through still photography and moving image, especially mid 20th Century cookbooks containing early examples of colour photography. The work is inspired by mainstream images of food in cookbooks, particularly visual depictions of idealised lifestyles which conjures shared social fantasies, perpetuated by mainstream images and our own internalisation of them. In my response, still photographs and moving image sequences explore staged scenarios and table sets which parody the lifestyles depicted in the books, to explore the social and domestic anxieties subtly generated and communicated. Research insights: Cookbooks are utilitarian - they have an instructional purpose, but are also aspirational, and filled with social-class anxieties. They not only tell one how to do a thing, but also imply value judgements, sometimes directly through words, and sometimes indirectly through photographs. The reality of preparing to entertain is hugely influenced by visual culture – we try to attain the mythical ideal, and in doing so perpetuate the visual myth. The output was exhibited and presented at; MAKE GOOD (group exhibition), Leeds Arts University, Sept 2019; PEERS (group exhibition), Vrij Paleis, Amsterdam, Sept 2019

L'expérience des étudiants faisant partie des communautés d'apprentissage dans les programmes de formation technique au collégial

This cross-sectional study compared how students developed connections to peers, faculty, program, and institution in a learning community with a dedicated learning space, to those formed in a learning community without such a space. Data on how students used and experienced the dedicated learning space were also collected and analysed. Students in two CEGEP programs offered at John Abbott College in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec, participated in the study. The experience of 46 first, third, and fifth semester students in the Information and Library Technologies (ILT) program was compared to 108 students in the same semesters in the Publication Design and Hypermedia Technology (PDHT) program. Mixed methods were employed to gather data. A general questionnaire was distributed to all students involved in the study during the ninth week of the Fall 2009 semester. Teachers in both programs tracked the frequency and nature of visits by students to their offices during three designated weeks of the semester. The information gained from this study adds to the knowledge about learning communities. This study also has implications for the allocation of space in other CEGEP programs. Finally, recommendations contained in this study may enable the planning and creation of multipurpose spaces within learning communities that enhance the experience of students.Résumé:Cette étude transversale visait à comparer les liens tissés par des étudiants avec leurs pairs, le corps professoral, le programme et l'institution lorsqu'ils évoluaient dans une communauté d'apprentissage bénéficiant d'un espace d'apprentissage réservé, et ceux développés par des étudiants formés dans le cadre d'une communauté d'apprentissage qui ne bénéficiait pas d'un tel espace. Des données sur l'utilisation et la perception de l'espace d'apprentissage par les étudiants ont également été recueillies et analysées. Des étudiants de deux programmes de cégep offerts au Collège John Abbott de Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue au Québec ont été invités à participer à l'étude. L'expérience de 46 étudiants au premier, troisième et cinquième semestre du programme de technique de la documentation (TD) a été comparée à celle de 108 étudiants des mêmes semestres du programme d'infographie et de technique hypermédia (ITHM). Des méthodes mixtes ont été utilisées pour recueillir les données. Au cours de la neuvième semaine du semestre de l'automne 2009, un questionnaire général a été distribué à tous les étudiants participant à l'étude. Pour la deuxième partie de l'étude, des procédures statistiques similaires ont été utilisées pour l'analyse des données provenant du questionnaire administré seulement aux étudiants en TD. Les réponses ont été analysées pour chaque niveau d'année scolaire. L'information tirée de cette étude ajoute à la connaissance des communautés d'apprentissage. Cette étude a également des répercussions sur l'allocation d'espaces pour les autres programmes de cégep. Enfin, les recommandations contenues dans cette étude pourraient permettre la planification et la création d'espaces multifonctionnels dans les communautés d'apprentissage pour améliorer l'expérience des étudiants