2017

We are proud to be part of Barkuma knowing that we are supporting more than 800 individuals/families simply to be included in our community. Our 50th birthday celebration at beautiful Carclew was a success and a great way say thanks to past and present ‘Friends of Barkuma’ for being part of this great journey. Given it is our 50th year, we also thought it was time for a change and after 18 years we decided to move from Currie Street to our new corporate office at 151B South Terrace.

During this year, we formed Barkuma Limited which will enable us to grow our business, manage our assets and apply for tenders interstate. In regards to building our assets we are pleased that Barkuma purchased a home in the Elizabeth area.

We have also completed a review of Barkuma’s Services and Leadership Team to ensure we have the right people in the right place to continue our success. This will allow us to carefully govern the organisation, manage our services appropriately, provide opportunities for the development of our staff and volunteers and ensure ethical practices and strong leadership across Barkuma. A great deal of time and resources has been, and will continue to be, directed into ensuring Barkuma is ready to operate under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), delivering outcomes via the services provided from planned supports. Barkuma is now ‘NDIS ready’ and able to deliver ‘person centred’ support to current and new clients.

The way we offer services in the future needs to change to ensure better outcomes for our customers and participants. We are proud of the specialised skills and knowledge we have within Barkuma. However, the changes in funding agreements and the expectations to deliver more flexible, consumer driven support will require Barkuma to be responsive, flexible, and agile in our service delivery. We will be required to work outside of our usual boundaries and within a variety of support models to ensure continuity of support to our clients.

This year also gave the opportunity to measure outcomes against the 2013 - 2017 Strategic Plan. We can report that we delivered on all key areas within the plan. We can proudly boast that we successfully passed the external audit against the six Disability Service Standards; this is essential evidence that tells us we are on the right track and are performing well.

In addition, the Board of Directors and the Leadership Team worked together to research, analyse and develop key strategies to guide Barkuma into the next three years. We can proudly report the development and implementation of Barkuma’s new Strategic Plan – ‘Beyond the Half Century’ setting the course for another 50 years of service delivery and support to the South Australian community.

Our Strategic Plan is based on our core values and we have adopted four Key Result Areas (KRA’S) which we at Barkuma absolutely must do to achieve our team’s business plans and goals. These KRA’s are the essential activities of Barkuma:

KRA 1- Service Delivery.

KRA 2- Building Organisational Capacity.

KRA 3- Work Force Development.

KRA 4- Financial Sustainability.

Over the coming years, we expect that all Barkuma personnel will contribute towards the completion of Barkuma Business Plans and the achievement of the KRA’s.

It is with honour and commitment to Barkuma that we present our report to the Association.

At Barkuma, we offer supports to people with disability and are a Registered NDIS Provider in South Australia. Each support places the participant at the centre of decision making. Click here to see our supports.

NDIS in 2016 - 17

Our staff continued to attend information sessions with the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) as well as Essential Briefings from National Disability Services (NDS). We continue to collaborate with a range of other not for profit disability organisations, to share findings and develop our services to meet the needs of new and existing Barkuma clients. We value customer feedback and survey our clients regarding their experiences with Barkuma in order to improve the way we support people.

From the very first day of the NDIS rollout in South Australia in February 2016, Barkuma have received approximately 50 new referrals. Through NDIS Plans we are supporting clients in the areas of Core Supports - which help you with your daily living needs such as personal care, housework and shopping; and Capacity Building Supports - which help you develop your skills and independence via individual assessments, assisting you to find and keep a job and assisting you to access the community independently, among many other ways.

The NDIS rollout is in full swing for adults, from 1 July 2017 eligible adults in the northern suburbs will have planning meetings with the NDIS and new and existing supported employees of our ADE’s will be funded via their individual NDIS Plans. It is Barkuma’s priority to ensure that this transition for our existing clients is as easy as possible and in order to achieve this much pre-planning work has been undertaken.

By July 2018 it is expected that all eligible people will have transitioned into the NDIS. Barkuma’s Strategic Plan will guide us along the path of increasing the range of supports we can offer, increasing the locations we can deliver these supports to and most of all offer a quality service to everyone who makes Barkuma their service of choice.

For the first time, Barkuma offered services to assist people with their NDIS plans through the coordination of supports. There are three types of coordination that Barkuma provides, support connection, support coordination and specialist support coordination.

Support Connection

This type of coordination aims to connect you with the supports you need and want. Barkuma work alongside people to investigate options, understand their plans, reach decisions and make agreements with providers to provide services.

Support Coordination

Support coordination is similar to support connection and follows the same process, but has a greater focus on addressing issues with providers, regular management of the plan to meet changing needs and regular monitoring and outcome reporting for the participant.

Specialist Support Coordination

This type of coordination provides the same process as support coordination, but focuses on when specialists are needed to provide a support.

New NDIS Plans

In 2016/17 we have assisted 46 people with their first NDIS plan. This has been predominately through a coordination of their supports, ensuring their goals are at the centre of their first plan. This is an exciting time for the sector and we’re looking forward to supporting more South Australians with disability.

Barkuma’s Transition, Better Pathways and Flexible Learning Options (FLO) programs operate on behalf of the Department of Education and Child Development (DECD).

Transition Program

Barkuma works collaboratively with the DECD, Catholic Education South Australia and the Association of Independent Schools of South Australia to deliver the Transition Program. In 2016, 65 students from 33 schools in South Australia successfully made the transition from school to their future pathways. During this year, Barkuma’s 17th class to graduated from the Transition Program. Students completed life skills development, studied and completed work experience in areas such as Information Technology (IT), retail and hospitality.

The Adelaide Convention Centre continued to loyally support Barkuma as the host for the annual graduation ceremony. The graduation evening recognises the hard work and dedication of the students, celebrating their success and future career prospects.

Better Pathways

Better Pathways has been working with students and their families since 2010 towards successful transitions from school to post school outcomes. In 2016 the Better Pathways team supported 24 students complete the program from six schools across the Barossa, Lower North and Playford regions. Bevan, a Better Pathways student, said on his profile "My life is like a giant book and others may try and write my story for me, but I am the one who is writing my own story." This quote epitomizes the person centred approach we use in this program and our supports as a whole organisation.

Flexibile Learning Options

The Flexible Learning Options (FLO) program supported 33 students across 12 different South Australian schools. Case Managers work with students to develop pathways towards their education and employment goals.

Barkuma Employment is our open employment service. We are a specialist disability employment service (DES) which means we find appropriate jobs in mainstream employment for people with developmental disability.

Milestones

Since we were established in 1986 we have had numerous examples of customers who have achieved long service in their employment with Barkuma’s support. This year we recognised the achievements of many customers including Theresa and Daniel who both completed 10 years’ service at Woolworths Tea Tree Plaza and Jessica who celebrated her 20 year work anniversary at International Tastes.

Continually Recognised for Service Excellence

The Disability Employment Services Star Ratings system measures the success of providers achieving outcomes for job seekers. Ratings are from one to five stars, with one being the lowest, and five being the highest. Providers who achieve a rating of 4 or above are seen as the best practice leaders in the nation. Barkuma Employment has maintained 4 star and above ratings since March 2014, with it increasing to 5 star in June 2014 which was maintained until September 2016.

Fostering new partnerships 

In 2016/17 we had 317 active jobs with employers across Adelaide, ranging from small family businesses to government and large private companies. This year we welcomed many new employers including the Police Credit Union and the Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure.

Expansion and Growth

Our focus for this year has been to continue to develop and grow our business through opportunities that are both viable and sustainable. We have been able to secure new contracts with Australian Clutch Services, while new customers include Evo Plastics, KI Olives, Coverfit, Vani-t, Ennio and Oz Indulgence, providing work accross both sites.

Employee Training & Development

We continued to have a strong focus on training and development, providing our employees new opportunities to develop professionally and personally. Specifically, Justin Kearvall recently moved into an Assistant Supervisor role and has obtained his forklift licence and Senior First Aid Certificate. Thanks to grants from the Tea Tree Gully Council, Morialta Trust and Suncorp, we were able to extend and expand our ‘Healthy Living’ program. Overall this program provided training to more than 100 people accross both our sites. Beyond this program, we also offered training in Work, Health and Safety.

NDIS Transition

As the full roll out nears we have been supporting our employees transition to the NDIS. We have worked with all 85 of our Elizabeth employees to complete a pre-planning booklet to bring along to their first planning meeting. The process is being replicated at our Holden Hill site to ensure all of our employees are NDIS ready.

Barkuma aims to develop and maintain life skills that increase confidence and independence both at home and in the community.

Accommodation and Respite

Our Accommodation and Respite team (formerly Barkuma Community Support) continued to support customers to live in and be a part of the community. In 2016/17 we supported 45 customers with a flexible, personalised service and were able to continue to develop individualised, goal focussed plans with a person centred approach. This included support in developing skills in the following:

• Budgeting and money handling
• Grocery shopping and food preparation
• Personal grooming amd health needs
• Travelling and mobility skills
• Personal and home safety
• Accessing community services
• Self-esteem and confidence building.

Our respite service expanded further, supporting six people to develop skills to move on to permanent accommodation. This year, amongst a change in structure we welcomed a number of new staff members to the culturally diverse team. We also continued to support Barkuma’s Registered Training Organisation (RTO) by offering placements to a number of students.

Support and Family Education

The Support and Family Education (SAFE) program provides support to parents with a cognitive disability with children under 5 and aims to further develop their parenting skills, improving the likelihood of maintaining the family unit. Delivered by our Intervention Supports team (formerly Client Services) the SAFE program supported six families across the metropolitan Adelaide and Barossa regions in 2016/17.

Barkuma Training is a Registered Training Organisation (RTO ID: 40010) which assists people build a career in the Disability Support Sector. Over the last 12 months we have continued to expand to meet the growing workforce demands as the NDIS continues to roll out.

Accredited Training

We have continued to build our reputation as one of South Australia’s leading disability training providers. In 2016/17 we delivered the following accredited courses:

• CHC33015 Certificate III Individual Support (Disability)
• CHC43115 Certificate IV Disability
• CHC43315 Certificate IV Mental Health.

Short Courses

Our non accredited short courses have provided opportunities for staff in the sector to further develop their careers in preparation for the NDIS. We have provided courses in Child Safe Environments, Manual Handling, Person Centred Thinking, Providing First Aid and Positive Behaviour Management.

Employment Outcomes

Barkuma Training has focused on the development of new support workers in response to the increased demand for quality staff in the sector. This focus has included working with students in the Cert III Individual Support program and our partnering organisations in the disability sector to turn our graduating students into employed support workers. 80% of Barkuma Training graduates in the Cert III Individual Support Disability qualification gained employment through their vocational placements and are well placed to have an impact on ensuring the delivery of high quality support within the sector.

Thank you to our generous supporters