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In August 2024, the Australian Children’s Commissioner released the report ‘Help Way Earlier! How Australia can transform child justice to improve the safety and wellbeing of children.’ The report investigates gaps in Australian youth justice systems and opportunities for reform, providing 24 recommendations for a cohesive coordinated response to one of the most urgent human rights issues facing Australia today.
For OT week this year, CETC ran a virtual workshop on attuning to the sensory needs of children and young people in care. Focusing on the power of co-regulation to teach self-regulation, Jenny Gay and Jess Wright were able to breakdown the basics of sensory processing, and how to adapt our care to identify and consistently meet the evolving sensory needs of children through our relationships.
Recent alarming regressions across Australia have moved youth justice policy towards punitive measures and away from evidence-based reforms like raising the minimum age of criminal responsibility. The CETC's response the Senate Inquiry into Australia's Youth Justice and Incarceration System calls for national, enforceable approaches to supporting rehabilitation and well-being for justice-involved young people.
Control-seeking behaviours can be a common daily experience for carers of children who have experienced trauma. The true challenge for therapeutics carers becomes understanding and addressing the needs that these behaviours communicate. This blog suggests 10 practical strategies to help carers meet the needs underlying children's control-seeking behaviours through connection instead of a power struggle.
Harmful sexual behaviour between young people is a serious and complex issue that requires more than legal change to address. While new affirmative consent laws and education are important steps forward, we need to make an active group effort to share accountability for educating young people on deeper underlying issues, such as gender inequality and respectful relationships, to positively influence community attitudes.
You may be familiar with the senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch, but have you heard of interoception? This sense helps children read their own body cues to understand how they are feeling before they react.
Online gambling poses unique risks to young people in out-of-home care, as they face heightened vulnerability due to trauma, self-regulation challenges, and limited adult support. Despite recent reforms targeting gambling harm, current protections fail to meet the specific needs of this group. This blog highlights why targeted intervention is crucial to safeguard young people in care from the pervasive lure of online gambling.
In Australia, children and young people with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) in out-of-home care are at critically greater risk of getting involved with the youth justice system. Over time, involvement in out-of-home care and youth justice can create a pattern of criminalisation, that spirals into a cycle of reoffending and deeper involvement with both systems. Breaking the cycle of FASD recriminalisation means providing early diagnosis, support and intervention.
Although kinship care now represents the majority of out-of-home care placements in Australia, comparatively little attention has been given to the risk factors and protective factors for grandparent carers experiencing secondary trauma. In this blog, researchers highlight the additional risk of secondary trauma to grandparent carers due to family crises, managing conflicting roles of carer and birth family, and personal connectedness to their grandchildren's experiences.
Last week, CETC facilitated an insightful panel about trauma-informed care and young people in youth detention. CETC welcomed Joanna O’Connor, Associate Professor Tim Moore and Murray Robinson to share their insights, reflections, experience and ideas with over 100 sector attendees.
Motivated by the frustrations of seeing Aboriginal children disconnected from their culture over seven years in the OOHC sector, Bradley Burns’ research focuses on elevating the voices of Aboriginal young people through a co-design approach. By integrating these voices into service delivery, he aims to create a more effective and culturally respectful OOHC system. His work critically examines existing practices, like Cultural Support Plans, emphasising the need for genuine collaboration and culturally grounded solutions.
Children and young people in out-of-home care often have limited experience of healthy and respectful relationships, which can make understanding affirmative consent and relationship boundaries challenging. This blog offers ten practical tips for talking about consent and sexual health in a trauma-informed way with children and young people in care.
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