Education: A two-way process

by Judy Cain, Education Coordinator, Mary of the Cross Centre, a service of Centacare Catholic Family Services

Introduction

The City of Yarra is home to many families from diverse cultures which have recently arrived in Australia . In order to assist with settlement, a community forum was held in 2006 at which some parents from the culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) community expressed concerns about the social context in which their children were mixing. They felt their confidence as parents was being undermined by lack of knowledge about legal issues, alcohol and drug use, young people's mobility and access to government benefits.

Provision of basic drug education

In response, a number of agencies in the City of Yarra joined forces under the auspices of the Yarra Drug and Health Forum to provide some basic drug education for people attending classes at the Fitzroy Learning Network (FLN). The driving force was Tony Brewin, Youth Resource Officer with Fitzroy Police, who had established a positive relationship with CLD youth and wanted to engage their parents in a proactive way to build stronger families and communities.

In the initial phase of planning the program, much discussion took place about which topics were most important, and it became apparent that we were quite ignorant about drug use in countries of origin, family relationships in the various cultures, the impact of transition and settlement and what the attendees wanted to know.

Consultation with the community

A seminar entitled "Survivors of torture & trauma—Understanding the issues and sensitivities", with input from Foundation House, was arranged for local workers. This proved extremely valuable in developing an understanding of the hierarchy of needs for the families we were to engage with and of their aspirations for their young people.

A consultation process was conducted by the regular teachers at FLN and revealed that participants wanted to know about the behaviour of drug-affected people, what to do if they witnessed illicit drug use in their neighbourhood and how to keep their children safe.

Knowing how important it is for newly arrived families to feel safe, the FLN coordinator, Sara Maher, liaised with the working party to run concurrent sessions for the students. A number of ethno-specific drug and alcohol/health workers from the inner city area responded generously to facilitate input and small group discussions in Arabic, Vietnamese, Dinka, Somali and Mandarin. We also used Dari and Hmong interpreters. Participants appreciated the opportunity to talk about such sensitive issues in their first language and felt free to lead the discussion in the direction of their own concerns. Follow-up sessions are planned.

For further information about the program, contact Sally Mitchell, Executive Officer, Yarra Drug and Health Forum, tel. (03) 9416 2459.