Community of Practice will provide collective response to domestic and family violence

With the theme “Orange the World: #HearMeToo”, the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence focuses attention on some of the most marginalised and under-serviced groups in our communities, including migrants and refugee women, women with disability, indigenous women and girls, as well as women in regional and rural communities.

A host of public events are being coordinated, among which iconic buildings and landmarks will be ‘oranged’ to recall the need for a violence-free future.

To observe the 16 Days of Activism campaign, Settlement Services International (SSI) in collaboration with the NSW Settlement Partnership (NSP) is launching a Community of Practice on Domestic and Family Violence (DFV) and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities, specifically focusing on supporting refugee and migrant women and girls.

“There is a wealth of experience and expertise in DFV and settlement across the sector, however there are limited mechanisms to share experiences, expertise and work together to amplify outcomes,” said Astrid Perry, SSI Manager of Strategic Policy.

“There is ample opportunity now to better understand and share this work, as well as strengthen and support our collective response to domestic and family violence.

“Women from CALD backgrounds experience a range of intersecting and compounding challenges (cultural, linguistic, economic and social) that place them at greater risk of experiencing DFV, and restrict their ability to seek support and redress for it.”

The Domestic and Family Violence – NSW Settlement Partnership Community of Practice (the DFV-NSP CoP) comprises DFV specialist workers, caseworkers and settlement managers from across the partnership, and is a mechanism by which NSP partners come together to share key learnings, and identify service delivery issues, practical responses and strategies to respond to DFV in their communities.

Overall the DFV-NSP CoP aims to:

• Share key learnings, seek advice and provide input for shared experienced in responding to DFV.
• Identify service delivery issues, practical responses and strategies to respond to DFV.
• Provide space for consultations on issues that can be fed into state, national and international advocacy.

The NSW Settlement Partnership (NSP) is a consortium of 23 community organisations, led by Settlement Services International (SSI), delivering core settlement support for humanitarian entrants and other eligible migrants in their first five years of life in Australia. These services are delivered in agreed areas in NSW, under the Department of Social Services’ Settlement Services Programme (SSP).

Join the 16 Days campaign! You can participate in person or on social media via the following hashtags: #OrangeUrWorld, #OrangeTheWorld, #HearMeToo, #EndVAW.

Contact: DFV Project Manager – Juliana Nkrumah AM, Manager Strategic Policy: Dr Astrid Perry.