COVER STORY
It’s time to come together As the Sunshine Coast community readies itself for NAIDOC Week celebrations next week, My Weekly Preview speaks to First Nations residents about their commitment to culture and their people. WORDS: Caitlin Zerafa.
REFOCUS practitioner Rommi Pukall. Image: Natasha Jade
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rom July 3 to 10 Australia will recognise an important time known as NAIDOC Week. The week is a chance for everyone to gain a deeper understanding of First Nations peoples, their culture and traditions and build a more united and accepting community. NAIDOC stands for National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee. Its origins can be traced to the emergence of Aboriginal groups in the 1920s, which sought to increase awareness in the wider community of the status and treatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. The Sunshine Coast is home to the Gubbi Gubbi/Kabi Kabi and Jinibara people where for more than 20,000 years, the traditional custodians hunted in the surrounding ranges, fished the rivers and gathered seafood from the ocean. This year’s NAIDOC Week theme is Get Up! Stand Up! Show Up! and it calls on the community to rally for systemic change and continue to support and secure institutional, structural, collaborative and co-operative reforms. On a local level, one organisation working day in, day out to make a difference is REFOCUS. The charity is making a profound difference in the wellbeing of Indigenous youth and their families across the region.
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REFOCUS has been delivering wellbeing support services to the Sunshine Coast, Moreton Bay and Gympie regions since 2010. The charity stands for ‘Redirecting and Empowering Families through Culturally Unique Services’ and provides a range of programs to support children to reach their full potential. REFOCUS CEO Darcy Cavanagh first began working in the youth and child protection sector in 1998 and knows firsthand the need for this type of support in the local community. “My interest in this line of work comes from my brief experience of being placed in the foster care system with my two brothers and the life that followed being returned home,” he says. “A lot of my experience, or so-called expertise, has come from my lived experience and learning from every person that I have come into contact with through my childhood and working career. “All these experiences led to the foundation of creating an organisation that focuses on the people and creates opportunity for people’s voices to be heard. “The service is not just about ticking boxes and reaching targets; it reaches the heart of a person and creates meaningful change and a sense of belonging.” Launching REFOCUS with six staff, and now with a team more than 60, the charity supports thousands of individuals
through a variety of programs across its catchment area, with a specific focus on children under 18. Programs include family wellbeing services, family participation programs, NDIS support services, foster and kinship care as well as Aboriginal medical service Gunyah of Wellness. Someone who knows how important REFOCUS’ services are is 22-year-old Tyrone Peisker. Struggling at school and having trouble connecting to his culture, the proud Aboriginal man was able to find a sense of belonging and tap into his creative side with the help of the organisation. “I was a young teenager who needed a lot of support to help me find my way,” Mr Peisker says. “I struggled at school and understanding [in] my mind what was going on around me. “REFOCUS team helped me connect to my culture, skills and interests that I didn’t know I had, like writing rap songs about my family and what I was going through as a young teenager. “I got to produce and film my own rap video, which was fun. I was able to connect with the local PCYC and gained awards for the writing work I did. “REFOCUS helped me to learn independent skills like going to appointments, cooking, cleaning, communicating with adults and the community, and work through my
Tyrone Peisker emotions. I am now able to live independently and make decisions for my life. Without them I don’t think I would be where I am now standing up for my life.” From a different perspective, youth worker Thomas Gower also found a purpose with REFOCUS. The 26-year-old Palawa man was born and raised on local land and speaks highly of how wellbeing services can make a difference to others in similar situations to himself, after he left school at a young age to work. “Due to my lack of education, I bounced through different jobs from manual labour to a deckhand on a fishing trawler. I was living a life without purpose. I had lost my identity,” he says. “At the beginning of 2018 REFOCUS offered me a traineeship in community myweeklypreview.com.au
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