- Finalists for 2025 Victorian Early Years Awards (VEYA)
- Three simple items have powered a groundbreaking cognitive test
- Members agree to enact a First Nations’ Collective voice to the country’s public health peak body
- FASD Awareness Strengthened by Community and Collaboration in Walungurru
- New peak body set to improve First Nations housing outcomes in South Australia
- Sector Jobs
The NACCHO Sector News is a platform we use to showcase the important work being done in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health, focusing on the work of NACCHO, NACCHO members and NACCHO affiliates.
We also share a curated selection of news stories that are of likely interest to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health sector, broadly.
Finalists for 2025 Victorian Early Years Awards (VEYA)
Improving Access and Participation in Early Learning
This award recognises one or more early childhood services and/or organisations that are taking action to promote access, ongoing participation and engagement in early learning, particularly for families experiencing vulnerability and/or disadvantage.
One of the finalists:
Victorian Aboriginal Community Services Association Ltd
In partnership with Goolum Goolum Aboriginal Cooperative, Gippsland and East Gippsland Aboriginal Cooperative, Wathaurong Aboriginal Cooperative, Njernda Aboriginal Cooperation and Dandenong & Districts Aborigines Cooperative Ltd
The Victorian Aboriginal Community Services Association Ltd (VACSAL) helps lead six Aboriginal Best Start sites. Best Start is a program run by local communities. It helps improve early childhood services by focusing on Aboriginal culture, identity, and self-determination.
VACSAL has worked with Best Start since it began in 2002. They give advice on what works to help more Aboriginal children go to kindergartens, Supported Playgroups, and Maternal Child Health services. They also help make sure these services make them feel welcomed, respected and safe.
VACSAL works with other groups to keep Aboriginal culture strong in the early learning centres they support. Their work is helping children go to early learning services, supporting families to connect with services, and fostering strong cultural identity amongst Aboriginal children.
Find out more about all the 2025 VEYA Finalists
Three simple items have powered a groundbreaking cognitive test
A dementia test developed for remote communities illustrates how science and local knowledge can help transform First Nations healthcare.
When health workers screen for dementia in the more than 100 remote Aboriginal communities of Western Australia’s far north, they bring a box of matches, a hair comb and an enamel-coated steel mug called a pannikin.
The clock-drawing test – a classic of mainstream medicine – was found long ago to be unreliable in the towns and settlements in and around Kimberley cattle stations. It simply never worked for almost 50 per cent of the population who are Aboriginal.
Instead, in the Kimberley, a health worker screening an Aboriginal patient will hold the matches, the comb and the pannikin one at a time and ask a different question for each item such as: “and what do you call this?” or “and what do you use this for?”. The patient responds in their first language, and an interpreter conveys the answers.
The simple items that have helped make the Kimberley-led Indigenous dementia screening program work. Source: Getty Images.
Members agree to enact a First Nations’ Collective voice to the country’s public health peak body
Members of peak body for public health, the Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA), have voted almost unanimously to create an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice to help guide its work.
After two years of hard work and consultation, the proposal known as the First Nations Collective Co-Design Project was passed at the association’s annual general meeting on Dharawal Country / Wollongong on 16 September. Formalising the work of the Collective required a change to the association’s constitution, and a vote from its members.
The Co-Design Project team was led by the immediate past PHAA Vice President (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) Dr Alana Gall a proud Truwulway woman from north-east Coast Lutruwita / Tasmania. It included Elders, and a Co-Design Strategy Group comprising early and mid-career Aboriginal researchers and practitioners in public health. Other members were First Nations mentees, and senior officials from the PHAA Governance structure including its president.
“A huge amount of work by myself and nine other Indigenous people – all volunteers – went into the two-year project to co-design the Indigenous governance model for the PHAA Collective,” Dr Gall, who is based at Southern Cross University, said.
“To see it accepted by most of the PHAA membership gives me hope post the failed Voice referendum, and makes all the hard work worth it.”
FASD Awareness Strengthened by Community and Collaboration in Walungurru
During September (FASD Awareness Month) the Health Promotion Officer for NOFASD Australia, Raina Quinny, at the invitation of community, spent some weeks in Walungurru (Kintore) participating in delivery of FASD awareness sessions and yarning circles. Raina noted how very much she valued the warm welcome she received from elders and the community, including invitations to be involved in sessions facilitated ‘on country’.
Chief Executive Officer of the Pintupi Homelands Health Service, Leander Menezes, commented, “Collaborating with NOFASD Australia here in Walungurru (Kintore), a very remote community in Central Australia, has been an incredibly rewarding experience. Seeing the local mob actively engage, share their stories, and participate so enthusiastically has been inspiring. Initiatives like this show the power of culturally safe partnerships in raising awareness about FASD and supporting our communities in meaningful ways. We are proud to work together to make a real difference on the ground, connecting with families, staff, and community members to strengthen understanding and care.”
Seen in the photo are from left: the CEO of Pintupi Homelands Health Services, Leander Menezes, along with the Pintupi health staff members and central- Raina Quinny, Health Promotion Officer of NOFASD Australia
New peak body set to improve First Nations housing outcomes in South Australia
The state government will commit $2.5 million over five years to support the establishment of a peak body aimed at improving First Nations housing outcomes.
The South Australian government will commit $2.5 million over five years to support the South Australian Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation Network (SAACCON) in establishing a peak body to improve First Nations housing outcomes.
The funding will be delivered through the South Australian Housing Trust.
According to a communique from the state government, the peak body will:
- “Recognise and empower Aboriginal leadership to drive Aboriginal-led decision making
- Advocate for Aboriginal housing needs across South Australia
- Support the development of an Aboriginal Community Controlled Housing Sector, which will provide both housing and housing support services, such as tenant management
- Strengthen partnerships between Aboriginal communities and government
- Drive innovation and accountability in housing outcomes.”
The communique notes that the body will “consult with communities and Aboriginal housing and homelessness services to effectively support and advocate for the needs of Aboriginal South Australians. It will also advise the government on how it can better interact, consult with and serve communities.”
The state government notes the new peak body will “consult with communities and Aboriginal housing and homelessness services to effectively support and advocate for the needs of Aboriginal South Australians.” Image: Denisbin/Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0
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