Family Services
St George Family Support Services Inc. work is a strengths based, trauma informed practice and is grounded in NSW Family Services’ nine Principles in Practice and five Statements of Premises.
Principles in Practice
- Staff and families work together in relationships based on trust and respect.
- Projects enhance families’ capacities to support the growth and development of all family members – adults, youth and children.
- Projects affirm and strengthen families’ social, cultural and racial identities and enhance their ability to function in a pluralist society.
- Projects are embedded in their communities and contribute to the community building process.
- Projects are flexible and responsive to emerging family and community needs.
- Principles of family support are modelled in all aspects of the project, including planning, management and administration.
- All members of a family should be safe from violence.
- Children should be provided with safe quality alternatives if it is deemed they can never live with their birth family.
- There is a recognition that families have multiple forms, not necessarily biologically based.
Statement of Premises
- Assuring the well being of families is a hall mark of a healthy society, and requires universal access to support programs and services.
- Family well being is linked to adequate economic and social supports.
- Families exist as part of an ecological system.
- Enabling families to build on their own strengths and capacities promotes the healthy development of all members of the family.
- The power of families to take action to improve the well being of their members is increased when they have access to information and resources.