‘Meaningful conversations…’ Co-creating care records for memory, identity and accountability needs of care experienced people | Monash University & Kids First Australia

Recordkeeping tasks form a significant part of the work undertaken in child, youth and family services. Research, inquiries and royal commissions in the past 10 years have emphasised the need for more child-centred and participatory recordkeeping practices, whilst equally recognising the workload pressures that practitioners remain under. This Australian Research Council-funded Real-time Rights-based Recordkeeping Governance project has brought together research partners from Monash University across human rights law, archival studies and social work to co-design rights-based recordkeeping governance principles with care experienced and service-connected advocates and Kids First Australia. This ‘Co-researcher’ team explored strategies for improving the memory, identity and accountability functions of care records that could assist care experienced people to make better sense of their families and childhoods, throughout their lives.

Care-experienced and service-connected advocates were recruited and reimbursed for ‘Co-researcher’ roles rather than as research participants, to conduct research instead of being a subject of it. This presentation details the participatory recordkeeping principles developed by Co-researchers to ensure that children and young people’s rights to participate in decisions made about their care are enacted and protected. 

The Co-research team identified mechanisms for monitoring and oversight that respond to the complexity of often conflicting rights of participation and protection. Participatory care planning, multi-perspective incident reporting, normative and strengths-based language all contribute to the co-creation of records to support the memory, identity and accountability needs of care experienced people. Procedural and deficit-focussed recordkeeping practices were identified as ‘othering’ practices that could make children and young people in care feel unheard, misunderstood and uncared for. Co-researchers were offered opportunities to undertake individual project work in areas of most interest, to contribute to the creation of resources to share and that extend the influence of Co-researchers’ contributions beyond their relatively short-term workshop participation. This work provides broad value in furthering the realisation of children and young people’s rights in recordkeeping whilst also contributing to the growing field of participatory practices in research, policy and governance.

Speakers: Monash University & Kids First

Jade Purtell

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Monash University

Jade is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Department of Human Centred Computing at Monash University working on the ARC-funded Real-time Rights-based Recordkeeping Governance project. Jade is a transdisciplinary researcher focussed on out-of-home care and transitions from care working across academia and the community sector to promote young people’s participation in research, policy development and practice.

Lara Gerrand

Youth Practice Lead, Kids First Australia

Lara is the Youth Practice Lead at Kids First Australia. Lara provides guidance and support to the youth programs within Client Services at KFA – strengthening the practice skills and knowledge of staff and supporting a practice culture that is evidence-based and ensures their sustainability.

Anna

Anna is passionate about advocating for social justice issues. She advocates across different sectors like family violence, disability, child protection, mental health and more.

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