Community Engagement Activities At Your Side Australia

Activities Undertaken

You are required to write a report reflecting on the social work placement that you completed with a non-profit organisation.

The placement lasted for forty hours of social work at the Your Side Australia organization. The Your Side organization, also known as Your Northside, is an organization that is located in Australia that focuses on helping and providing support services for the old aged people, people living with a disability, people suffering from mental health and their carers throughout Sydney in Australia. For the past thirty years, the organization has had one major goal, that is ensuring that each person lives their best life. The organization has also put measures that ensure that all of their customers are fully satisfied with all the services provided by the organization (Bowen, Newenham-Kahindi and Herremans, 2010). By doing this they have received a lot of positive feedback from their clients and have used this feedback to improve their services. At Your Northside, each choice and decision made by the customer is respected and the organization is always mindful and responsible for the customer’s needs. The services delivered by the organization to the customers, funders and to the whole community as a whole is always reliable (Lee, Kim and Kim, 2011). Integrity is a virtue that has helped a lot of organizations to prosper. The organization has understood this factor and has ensured that they act sincerely, consistently and transparently with each other and in the best interests of their customers and their funding bodies at all times.

The major activities of the organization majorly comprise of taking their clients out so as they can have fun and enjoy their life. They have buses that pick up their clients from their houses and also their volunteers at certain stations and then take them to the place or activity that is planned for that day. There are various activities that the organizations undertake on its daily schedule. These activities include taking its clients to yoga classes, concerts, shopping centres and malls, art galleries, and Fresh tracks and parks. They also do take their clients for lunch. By doing this, the organization ensures that it achieves its goal of ensuring that each of its clients lives his/her life to the fullest and to their best (Butin, 2010). Such activities have seen them help over 75,000 clients all over Sydney. The report below entails a summary of the placement period at the Your Side organization that lasted for forty hours. The reports describe the list of activities undertaken at the organization, the challenges faced and various suggestions so as to improve the activities in the organization. The placement involved working as a volunteer in the organization and assisting the employees with their day to day activities. This involved in helping the clients in their yoga classes, taking them to Karaoke and also taking them to concerts.

Challenges Encountered

As mentioned earlier, the organization serves a large community of people which includes the old aged, people living with a disability, and those people who suffer from mental health. The people served during the placement period at the organization including the people on wheelchair, the old people who could walk but needed assistance in walking, and the old people who were mentally ill, alone or having speech problems. During this period, the volunteers were involved in taking these people to various places on the buses so that they could have fun and enjoy their life. The experience was fun as there was a lot of interaction with many people. This brought an understanding that the different clients required different needs (Ahmed and Palermo, 2010). Being a volunteer at the organization means that one had to be involved in various activities taking place (Briggs, 2010). Visiting the Wollongong Diggers Club with the old people was one of the activities.  At the club, these people were treated to a lot of fun activities and music and they really let out their dancing skills while dancing to the music. Some expressed the dance moves that they used to showcase during their prime years. One also took the disabled people on wheelchairs to the karaoke at Chatswood RSL. Despite their disabilities, these people were really talented in singing.

Despite all the fun experienced by the organization, there were some disadvantages encountered during the placement period. These challenges include speech issues. Some of the clients at the organization could not communicate properly and thus there was a communication barrier. These people could fully express themselves and it was difficult attending to their needs such as feeding, bathing and even clothing. Another challenge experienced was that some of the clients could require assistance in using the toilets. Clients suffering from dementia had a hard time using the toilets and thus required assistance in the process (Sheppard, Shaw, Flanders, Burch, Wiek, Carmichael, Robinson and Cohen, 2011). People that suffer from dementia have no control of their bowels and bladders and thus experience difficulties related to using the toilets. These clients required a lot of attention which meant that some of the clients had to be neglected for a little while so as to assist these other clients. Some clients needed help in eating and drinking. A client suffering from mental illnesses and disability and also the old aged clients could not feed themselves. Such clients required a lot of attention (Driscoll, 2008). The clients on wheelchairs could not push wheelchairs and thus required someone to assist them to move from one place to another (Weiss, Lopez, and Rosenberg, 2010).

Improving Community Engagement Activities

Community engagement is a broad term to define and most people have defined it as the process where people come together to address the issues that affect the public (Weerts and Sandmann, 2010). Over the years, community engagement has increased, and more people are being involved in various activities that involve helping other people in the community. There are a lot of benefits associated with community engagement. Community engagement advocates for more participatory forms of direct democracy. Through community engagement, support, agreements and momentum for public actions are generated (Attree, French, Milton, Povall, Whitehead and Popay, 2011). Stronger communities around the world are built through continued community engagement. This is because community engagements to address the issues on improving the production and delivery of public goods and services.

Theoretical community engagements involve the research and practical experience from around the world. This involves concepts for planning a successful community engagement program (Wallerstein and Duran, 2010). One first needs to understand the depth and broadness of the approach that one intends to pursue. There are five factors that one must consider when planning for a community engagement. The first factor is to communicate. Informing the community will assist the community in understanding the various opportunities, problems and solutions (Chin, Clarke, Nocon, Casey, Goddu, Keesecker, and Cook, 2012). Communication can be done through dialogue, newsletters, websites and exhibitions. Keeping the public informed through information dissemination is vital. Consultation is a factor that one must always consider. This involves obtaining feedback from the public on analysis, alternatives and decisions (Hood, Brewer, Jackson, and Wewers, 2010). This means that one must focus on surveys and public meetings to carry out consultation process. Involvement is a crucial factor that one must always consider. This involves working directly with the public so as to ensure that all public concerns are always considered and understood (Anderson, 2017). Workshops and deliberative polling are some of the faces to face dialogues that will involve the public in the process. Collaborating with the public on all aspects of decision making is an important factor to consider. One should always ask for help from the community when coming up with solutions. The final factor is empowering which involves investing in time and resources and capacity building (Damingo, 2012.)

The placement at the Your Side organization involved various activities that had connections with the theoretical community engagement. The organization has clearly communicated its activities to its clients. The organization has clearly explained that it is majorly focusing on ensuring that the old people, people living with disabilities and those suffering from mental illnesses live the best of their lives (Partington and Totten, 2012). There is also participating as it allows volunteers to work in the organization. As a volunteer at the organization, one is required to participate in various activities that involve helping the customers have fun (Musa, Ibrahim, Abdullah, Saee, Ramli, Mat and Khiri, 2017). This involves taking the clients to Karaoke and also to yoga classes. The volunteers do also participate in these yoga classes. To understand the various needs of the clients, the volunteer has to be actively involved and collaborative with the clients. The volunteer is participatory in the activities. the organization also has a method which involves picking up its clients from their homes, and their employees at certain stations and ferry them to their planned activities using buses.

The Principle of Reciprocity

There are various strategies that the organizations need to introduce in their daily activities so as to improve their community engagement. one of the strategies that they will have to improve is prioritizing their community groups. The organizations need to have a clear representation of the community groups that they have and understand the impact they have on the organization. These community groups include the old, the disabled and those suffering from mental illnesses. Picking the best engagement strategy is very important for the organization. This involves having a clear understanding of the group’s concerns. They have provided their clients with clear information about the organization and its activities.

The principle of reciprocity involves both the organization and the client benefiting from the activities undertaken. Through the placement, the student was able to benefit a lot from the community engagement services, so did the customers. The student has been able to develop skills that he/she acquires from the placement. The student has learnt a lot of integrity from the organization. The organization aims at doing their activities in an honest, consistent and transparent act for the best interests of their customers and their funders (Boubas and Harous, 2013). Having dealt with people with disabilities and those suffering from mental health, the student has developed that appreciates these people and productive people in the society. The student has learnt to be a leader and be financially efficient. The organization is always accountable for its actions and this educates the student to be accountable for his/her action as they are important to the clients and the community (Ali, 2014).

The skills developed during the placement period at the organization include better communication skills. The activities at the organization require communicating with the client effectively (Nguyen, Boon, and King, 2016). Through this one is able to have a clear understanding of the client’s needs. Through this, the student was able to develop better communication skills that allowed him to communicate with different people. Negotiation skills were also developed during the period. Due to the interaction with different people especially those at the yoga classes and at the clubs, the student was able to negotiate well these people

References

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