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Assistance and support for children returning to their family home.
Pathway Home provides assistance and support to help children return to their family home in the North and North West of Tasmania.
The program is for children and young people who have been in out-of-home care and referred by the child safety branches of the Department for Education, Children and Young People. It also supports and assists families to ensure a stable family environment. Each support is tailored to the need of the child and family.
This program provides:
Referrals into the Pathway Home program can only be received directly from Child Safety Services
Damien was referred to the Pathway Home program to assist with the reunification of his four children. Child Protection Services had identified concerns about Damien’s emotional health in regard to dealing with crises and relationship breakdowns. There had been two incidents of Damien harming himself with a children present. There was concern about cannabis use and the stress Damien may experience parenting his four children, all entering adolescence.
At the time of the referral to Pathway Home, Damien had begun to engage with Child Protection Services and he had unsupervised contact with his four children.
All four children reported that they wanted to go home, and they wanted their dad to be ok.
A six-stage reunification plan was written up but before this could be put into place, the children were returned to Damien’s care full time. A ‘signs of safety’ plan was completed to take the place of the reunification plan and assist with Pathway Home involvement. During safe communication sessions all four children reported that they wanted to go home, and they wanted their dad to be okay.
Contact between the family and the Pathway Home worker occurred at least twice weekly, including scheduled and unscheduled visits and phone calls. During the time Pathway Home was involved, Damien worked willingly with Pathway Home and numerous Child Protection Services concerns were addressed. Damien and the Pathway Home worker discussed the signs of a crisis and developed a safety plan for what would happen if he felt like harming himself.
Damien worked on specific parenting strategies for teenagers such as consequences, boundaries and developmental stages. He discussed his own childhood trauma and began to work through this in a helpful way. He talked about family violence and anger, and the impact this has had on his children.
He sought involvement from other support services such as personal counselling through the CAB program, budgeting and financial assistance with Family Matters, and he was supportive of the children having their own personal counselling with the school and outside support services.
Fourteen months after beginning with Pathway Home, the Care and Protection Orders on Damien’s four children were lapsed, and all four remain in his care.
Pathway Home is funded by the Department for Education, Children and Young People (Tasmania).
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