Pathways wins Award
The ‘Who Am I?’ project has won a University of Melbourne 2010 Engagement Award for Pathways, which was described by the panel as “an outstanding example of engagement” with external partners and with the wider community. The Award Ceremony is taking place at the University in early October 2010.
Pathways was launched one year into the three year long project so that the website could be further developed in response to feedback from our partner organisations, people who were in out-of-home care, and the broader public. Although it could be said to be a ‘work in progress’, Pathways is already a comprehensive resource, and is making it easier for organisations to provide services to ‘Forgotten Australians’.
The Pathways website is one outcome of the ‘Who Am I?’ project. The project involves the University, together with Australian Catholic University, and 12 partner organisations providing services to Forgotten Australians in Victoria. The partners come from the community services sector, consumer groups and the Department of Human Services to form a group that has made possible engagement with stakeholders at multiple levels.
The process of developing content for Pathways, and working with Forgotten Australians to ensure that its design was user-friendly and accessible, has raised awareness in the sector about the importance of archives and has already led to improvements in practice within our partner organisations.
We (the ‘Who Am I?’ project team) will continue to populate the Pathways database over the course of the ‘Who Am I?’ project (until end-2011), and work closely with our stakeholders to ensure that it is relevant and accessible. The emails we receive from our users will provide us with ongoing and valuable feedback about how to improve the website to meet the needs of our target audience.
Thanks very much and congratulations to all who have contributed to Pathways.