Biographies & Abstracts J-Q
Catherine Jackson Gidgup is W.A. Aboriginal from the Nyoongar, Yamirji First Nation’s People. Catherine is a mother of three and grandmother to six grandchildren. She is a carer, community advocate, and trainee group leader at Gamarada, where she turned for helped to overcome struggles with substance use. Catherine has led Dadirri meditations at Gamarada and she sees this practice of deep listening and quiet stillness as crucial for her to regain her spirit. In 2015 she co-presented on Dadirri at the Australian Association of Social Workers National Symposium in Sydney. She is currently doing an internship with the Sydney Alliance.
Chris ‘Bandirra’ Lee is a recognised Traditional Owner for the Larrakia peoples of Darwin in the Northern Territory. He has a long career in Indigenous affairs including senior management positions in Indigenous media and communications, Indigenous community organisations and the private and public sectors. Chris’s career includes over two decades working within the Criminal Justice system starting as a youth worker in QLD and the NT. He joined Queensland Corrective Services as a Custodial Correctional Officer at Wolston Correctional Centre. Chris progressed to unit manager when he sought to broaden his experience when he was engaged as an Indigenous Adviser at the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC). Chris joined the Australian Digital Futures Institute at the University of Southern Queensland in June last year to engage with incarcerated Indigenous students through the Making the Connection project.
This presentation reports on an Australian government HEPPP-funded project, Making the Connection, which enables prisoner participation in digital higher education at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ) in prisons with a view to reducing recidivism, particularly for Indigenous Australians.
Participation in education can help those incarcerated to develop critical thinking skills, digital literacies and the capacity for self-reflection. In addition, it promotes the prospects for employment on release and promotes positive connection to community and families. This helps reduce the risk of reoffending upon release, by equipping people with the cognitive tools to engage constructively with families, communities and an increasingly digital society.
Bidjara woman Keelen Mailman is Chairperson of Bidjara Traditional Owners and Property Manager, Mt Tabor Station. She has highly developed leadership and cultural healing skills. She is an author (The Power of Bones, Allen & Unwin 2014) in demand around Australia as a guest speaker on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues as well as on leadership. Keelen completed an Australian Rural Leadership Program and is a Bidjara Native Title applicant. Keelen is currently Australian Mother of the Year. She has strongly advocated for the Healing and Rehabilitation Centre project on Bidjara Land.
Mount Tabor Station Healing and Rehabilitation Centre Pilot Project
Objective: To achieve a significant reduction over a defined period in the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people detained in QLD prisons and support a reduction in their recidivism rate, desirably to at least that of non-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
The Mount Tabor Project empowers Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander enterprises through service contracts to accommodate offending young people in Healing and Rehabilitation Centres on Traditional Land. It is a precursor to a larger project for these Centres on other Traditional lands delivering culturally appropriate rehabilitation services on country with a joined up services model to support community transition. The project empowers Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander enterprises to deliver services within the criminal justice system and in other areas. It is built around justice re-investment, restorative justice principles and on country Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander healing practices.
Carolyn Minchin is a social work student at Charles Sturt University with a background in teaching and counselling. Carolyn is developing programs for teacher wellbeing with Gamarada Universal Indigenous Resources, through dialogue between Indigenous practice wisdom and third wave behavioural science. The dialogue project has also focussed on suicide prevention and risk management, co-presenting with Ken Zulumovski on Dadirri and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) at the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Suicide Prevention Evaluation Project conference in May 2016. She is a member of the Association for Contextual Behavioural Science and studies with Marsha Linehan through Byron Clinic.
Gayle Munn and Robert Lacey are two of four Founding Partners of the Lateral Peace Project.
Gayle is a Gunggari woman and Robert is a Waka Waka man. They have decades of experience and community involvement in a variety of roles that include: CEO AISHRA, Regional Manager DATSIP, Social Justice Group Members Murri Court Sitting Members, RAP members, Advisory Committee Member Lifeline, Men's Women's and Child and Youth Healing Camp Coordinators and Facilitators, Cultural Heritage Coordinator, Cultural Educators. Both have extensive experience working in the corrective services system, having served on Murri Court and Justice Groups
Work History includes The Commission for Children, Young People and Child Guardian, Health Education and Training, Department of Corrective Services, Vocational Education, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Services Social and Emotional Wellbeing Counsellor, Prison Welfare Officer.
Qualifications - Counselling, Mental Health, Mental Health First Aid, Training and Assessment, Life Coaching, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Touch Therapy. Professional Development: Peace Ambassadorship, Mindfulness and the Hakomi Method in Counselling, Mindfulness and Emotional Healing, Circle of Security Parenting Both Gayle and Robert have presented Papers internationally. Robert at the United Nations - Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Gayle and Richard at Healing Our Spirits Worldwide - Re-establishing Our Sense of Belonging and Restoring Peace in Aboriginal Communities.
Lateral Peace Project Presentation Outline:
Intergenerational trauma and the sense of disconnection is interwoven throughout all facets of Aboriginal society. It is visible in behaviours that are the product of trauma and disconnection; behaviours such as lateral violence and other types of violence, addictions and dysfunctional relationships.
The presentation explains
How connection, relationship, bonding and belonging are imperative ingredients for Spiritual, social, emotional, mental, cultural and physical wellbeing.
How the sense of disconnection and severed relationship to people and place passed down through DNA contributes to addiction and criminal behaviour.
The presentation offers suggestions for change across all sectors of the corrective services system.
Cleonie Quayle and Keith Quayle. Keith has lived experience of the prison system and he shares his journey through culture and healing to social enterprise. His mother Cleonie has spent many years in the legal sector, supporting Aboriginal women, for example at the Wirringa Baiya Aboriginal Women’s Service in Sydney. Cleonie is studying a Master’s degree in criminology, raising grandchildren, and involved with Global Sisters and the social enterprise movement. She creates and sells beautiful Indigenous jewellery.
.
