PWDA-Landing-Page-Header - People with Disability Australia

Engage-In project

Engage-In is an exciting project that aims to break down the barriers people with psychosocial disability face when they try to access services from closed settings (institutions).

These barriers can be cultural as well as structural.

Our key objective is to empower people to live their best lives in the community. One way we can do this is by supporting people with psychosocial disability in accessing the NDIS and other mainstream services.

Our emphasis is on community-based peer involvement, such as connecting people in closed settings with recovery coaches who have experience of psychosocial disability.

Engaging confidently with psychosocial disability

Training module designed for all workers from frontline to executive level, in any sector or industry, this one day, or two half-day workshop provides an understanding of how to engage appropriately when working with colleagues or clients who experience psychosocial disability. The workshop provides practical tools that equip and guide you in your interactions. Please call (02) 9370 3100 or email training@pwd.org.au.

Peer-led discussion, consultation, and practice

Peer workers (people with experience of psychosocial disability who form the Engage-In’s Project Advisory Group or PAG) have collaborated with PWDA project officers to access and support consumers/survivors in closed settings.

Drawing upon these insights, a community of practice (CoP) worked on solutions to the structural and cultural barriers advocates face in making connections with people in closed settings.

Partnerships

An action research framework has been co-designed by the PAG and the University of Sydney Faculty of Education and Social Work to develop a desired practice model for working with people with psychosocial disability.

This desired practice model has informed a training program, run by people with experience of psychosocial disability, for staff at PWDA. We envisage that this program will be replicated by other services striving to revitalise their practice.

The University of Sydney partnership has also produced a research report to document the work of Engage-In.