Mallee Family Care’s Community Development Unit is focused on the development and implementation of programs that work towards ensuring access and engagement in education from a child’s early years through to tertiary study.

The work of the agency has shown that in our work with families, while we have provided intervention strategies, we haven’t always been able to make a difference in changing the life outcomes for young people. Due to this, Mallee Family Care has developed a long standing and keen interest in looking at new ways of doing things so we can change the life outcomes for the young people in our community.

For us, the critical link in making these changes in life outcomes and discovering opportunities and possibilities is education.

The establishment of Chances for Children in 2000, a program which seeks to ensure that financial barriers do not prevent local young people from reaching their dreams and potential, brought to light other barriers faced by young people in accessing and engaging in education.

We have found that there are many children in our community who, for a range of reasons, are not exposed to positive experiences in learning from their earliest years, resulting in them struggling with learning for the rest of their school life, having limited aspirations leading to poor life outcomes.

Our findings were confirmed through clear and documented evidence that indicates that children who start school with language and behavioral issues that go unassisted are faced with ongoing failure. Professor Tony Vinson (author of Mildura’s Social Indicators Reports) identifies clear linkages between gaps or delays in a child’s early education and longer term poor outcomes for individuals across education, health and employment.

It is clear to us that inadequate education is central to the onset and persistence of social disadvantage. There is a significant amount of research that indicates that the more successful this engagement and the earlier it begins, the more successful life outcomes a person has.

It is for these reasons that the Community Development Unit focuses on developing and offering programs that strengthen a child or young person’s engagement with learning and education – and assist disadvantaged and vulnerable families achieve their full potential.

The Community Development Unit demonstrates Mallee Family Care’s ongoing commitment to initiatives that seek to make a difference in our community and region.