Interim Evaluation of the Northern Territory Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Aged Care Workforce Development Projects - Attachments
4.3 Julalikari
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4.3.1 Community
Tennant Creek is a small township of about 3,500 people, located 500 kilometres north of Alice Springs and 1,000 kilometres south of Darwin. It’s a place shaped by Aboriginal culture, gold mining and pastoralism. The surrounding area is called the Barkly Tablelands, a region characterised by wide grassy plains, endless blue sky and massive cattle stations.The traditional Aboriginal owners of the area surrounding Tennant Creek are the Warumungu people. Their culture and stories are showcased at one of the country’s best art and cultural centres called Nyinkka Nyunyu. Waramungu is the main language of Tennant Creek and surrounding communities however there are now more speakers of Warlpiri or Alyawarr living in Tennant Creek97.
Tennant Creek is also known as the ‘Golden Heart of the Northern Territory’ – a name that refers to the warm personalities of its people and because it is the site of Australia’s last major gold rush in the 1930s. People initially looked for gold in quartz, but it wasn’t until the 1930s that they discovered that the gold was still in the ironstone.
The town’s goldmining history remains, and is captured at sites around the town such as the Battery Hill Mining Centre. In fact, it’s thought that there is still plenty of gold to be found, and mining for this and other valuable minerals, like manganese and copper, remains a vital economic contributor for the region98.
Further information about this community was not available at the time of the evaluation.
4.3.2 Aged Care Service
Julalikari has a women’s centre and men’s centre and provides meals to around 18 men and women who live in and around Tennant Creek. The service has eight HACC clients and around 10 CACP clients. The service also provides a day respite service and emergency or planned overnight respite and laundry services. There are two houses available for permanent supported accommodation for intellectual disability clients and plans to have 10 flats available for aged and disability clients to live with their family carers in the near future.There are a large number of staff working at Julalikari and men and women generally work separately in gender groups. There is a mix of younger and older men and women on staff which allows for mentoring of skills and support. Some of the younger women have higher literacy abilities and shared during interview that they all work together as a team to complete written materials required as part of the training delivered. Some of the men identified that they have very limited literacy but this did not impact on their ability to participate in training or gain the skills required for their roles. Further these men said that they were not going to further develop their literacy further: we’re too old to learn!
The main focus of service delivery is meal delivery; but some of the clients visit the centre daily and are provided with company and some activities. Female staff were working on their training workbooks during the on-site visit and were working together to answer questions and discuss the training that had been delivered. Staff were keen to participate in dementia training that they were accessing from Alzheimer’s Australia in the near future.
4.3.3 Pre-Training Telephone Interview
At the time of the pre-training interview Julalikari had 18 staff including a coordinator. All staff, including the coordinator were Indigenous. The coordinator was unsure of how many staff had previously been on CDEP and since converted to paid positions, but identified that of the eight care worker staff, six were currently in CDEP converted positions. It was also reported that there were nine current CDEP workers. Three workers were interviewed and all three reported that conditions were better than when on CDEP.The coordinator reported that in terms of training required, long-term workers required training in numeracy and literacy, disability and dementia. It was suggested that newer staff required training in computer skills and basic administration. It was also identified that all staff required driver education training. At the time of pre-training interview, feedback received from the RTO suggested that key areas of training would be in Cert II and III in HACC. The coordinator also suggested that were it available to coordinators, training was required in budgeting and financial planning.
The coordinator suggested that in order to improve the success of training:
A lot of encouragement and praise is needed - the more that do it (training) the better, because they then have each other to bounce off.
At the time of the pre-training interview the coordinator was keen for as many workers to participate in training as possible. Three workers were interviewed and all three reported they were looking forward to the training.
4.3.4 Post-Training Site Visit
At the time of the site visit the service reported that training had been delivered in:- Domestic assistance
- OH & S
97. http://www.clc.org.au/People_Culture/language/language.html
98. http://en.travelnt.com/explore/tennant-creek/tennant-creek.aspx
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