Working Group on Multicultural Services (NSW) 9:30 am Thursday 15th August, 2019 Concord Library
Minutes
Apologies – Kira Paznikov (Central Coast Council); Vivien Chung (Willoughby Council); Eugenia Ng (Burwood Council); Joanna Bragg (ACT Libraries); Sofia Silvestri (Cumberland Council); Laurence McDonnell (Blacktown Council). Attendees – Sharlene Louey (City of Sydney); Katherone Zhu (Randwick City); Pauline Chan (Parramatta Council); Nehal Rana (Parramatta Council); Irena Tichackova (Hornsby Library); Ayse Ersay (Waverley Council); Vanessa Maino (City of Ryde); Kasia Malicka (Burwood Council); Kathy Yang (Inner West Council); Vicki O’Rourke (Wollongong Council); Shauna Miller (SLNSW); Oriana Acevedo (SLNSW); Joelmon Zungar (Blacktown Council); Sujalha Thadakamalla (Fairfield City); Sarah Wild (Canada Bay Council); Jadwiga Krejza (Liverpool City); Kirsty Plumridge (Cumberland Council).
Welcome – Phillip Edney - Manager of Canada Bay Library Service
Confirmation of previous minutes – Pauline Chan (Parramatta) and Joelmon Zungar (Blacktown)
Presentation – Brodie Purdon – Solicitor and Registered Migration Agent (The Refugee Advice and Case Worker Services group – RACS) Brodie explained how her organisation provides legal support to asylum seekers who are looking to get refugee status. She highlighted the three key services they provide – case work, drop-in service at Auburn, Westmead and Randwick and a telephone advice service. Brodie gave an overview of the legal process and how intricate it can be, and explained how important it is to assist these vulnerable people navigate the Australian legal system. Brodie also acknowledged the important role libraries play in assisting asylum seekers and refugees with printing, scanning and Internet services. She suggested each Library have a list of referral services to hand to our customers with form filling services, legal assistance, English class information and health information. Brodie’s powerpoint’s will be included as an appendix.
Strategic Plan – Review Jadwiga briefly mentioned that this meeting we have met Objective 3 – Strategy 2 ‘To encourage co-operation and networking amongst public libraries, the State Library of NSW and other organizations’ by inviting both RACS and Moana from Cumberland Council to speak to the group. Multicultural Excellence Awards – Oriana Acevedo (SLNSW) Oriana advised everyone that the applications for the Multicultural Excellence Awards are now open. Library Managers will be informed in the next week or two. She encouraged each of us to submit our projects and the winning library will receive a $1500 prize. Applications close on Friday 27 September.
Form Filling Service – Moana Kailahi (Cumberland Council – Berala Community Centre Director) Auburn Council (now Cumberland Council) has been offering a form filling service since 2014 and is a partnership between TAFE and Council. The students that are undertaking a Diploma in Community Services are required to do 100 hours of work placement, and Council needs a form filling service so it is a win/win situation. Approximately 20 students do their placement every 6 months and TAFE have a supervisor that attends every 6 weeks. There is no time limit to the service and occasionally students can spend up to 3 hours with one client. The students are allocated to a roster and must phone if they are unwell. We currently have 5 sessions a week with two students at each session. Participants must fill in a “Authority to Assist” which clearly outlines that the person helping them is a volunteer, and that they are not responsible for any information provided in the form. The students are provided with trainings sessions and a laptop, and access to a mobile for translating/interpreting services, if required. The students can assist with Centrelink forms, citizenship forms, medicare forms, child support forms, school enrolment forms and other general forms but DO NOT offer assistance with visa applications – unless the participant can provide a letter that verifies they have been given legal advice
LOTE activities - Oriana Acevedo (SLNSW) Oriana has reported that there has been lots of support but no progress on amending the legislation to protect AV suppliers. Most suppliers are still supplying materials but at a risk. Oriana will be contacting ALIA in the next week to see if there is any news. Discussion ensued about how DVDs are slowly disappearing as more people begin to use streaming services, but it is still important to provide the access!! Fairfield subscribe to Canopy – a film streaming service with lots of languages and reported that a lot of people come in between 8pm – 12pm to watch Canopy.
MWGM Wiki Demonstration Most people used the wiki to download the agenda successfully. It will be the responsibility of the group secretary to upload agendas and minutes to the wiki and update the content if required. Changes should be bought up at meetings and amendments made accordingly.
Tech Savvy for seniors – Shauna Miller (SLNSW) Shauna reported that the acquittals have nearly been sorted from last financial year and the grant applications process for this year has closed. There is still a small pool of money available so please contact Shauna if you have any late requests. Shauna is now in the process of collecting the signed agreements and tax invoices. The group provided feedback on a poster that has been developed. The following suggestions were made – • The statement ‘Free technology training sessions for seniors’, should be placed at top of document • The poster should include a statement reading ‘For more information ask your local library’ • Translate the entire document but Oriana explained that translated materials cost a lot of money, and this money is better used for hosting more classes There are currently handouts on the Tech Savvy website in – Arabic, Dari, Greek, Hindi, Italian, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Vietnamese, Tagalog, Macedonian and Croatian. Shauna highlighted the importance of promotion and to contact community organisations or perhaps advertise in community language newspapers? Many of the educators are very proactive promoters of the program but it is the responsibility of the Library to get the class numbers and promote appropriately.
Volunteer Training Skill Set Course (Free course) – Pauline Chan (Parramatta Library) Parramatta Library and TAFE have partnered to offer a free digital course on how to be a volunteer. This course is open to anyone eligible to enrol in TAFE and comprises of four face-to-face workshops, plus an online component. The course runs for 12 weeks and includes 20 hours of community service volunteering. All students that complete the free course will gain credits and can enrol in Level 3 – Community Services at a cost. Pauline is encouraging everyone to roll this out at their Library.
General Business Sujhal - Fairfield Fairfield asked if we could start a database where everyone lists their community language suppliers. The group has trialled this before but felt it was more productive to email the group for advice when required as the information changes too rapidly, and avoids supplier conflicts. Fairfield has diversified their programs and now have a production studio – with recording facilities, form filling, and a PC desk for digital assistance.
Katherine – Randwick Katherine reported that her loan statistics for community languages has dropped and she has been asked to investigate the trends and make suggestions to improve the service. She began by looking at other Libraries and who has the top performing collections in languages other than English. Others felt this was not a great indicator as each Council has unique demographics and this will impact who to service and who will use the Library.
Oriana suggested holding focus group sessions with CALD community groups to assess their use of the Library and its collections, and get specific feedback. Fairfield suggested moving the language collections very six months between branches –as their community like to browse the shelves and this ensures new books. The group also agreed that many people are moving away from physical collections to digital – particularly for community language collections. Cloud Library is a great means of showcasing digital collections in other languages and Borrowbox is looking at translating their audio books into a wide variety of world languages. Wavesound are also offering a multi-user platform for its e-books now.
Vicki – Wollongong Vicki shared a couple of the programs they have conducted in the last few months. For Refugee Week they had a program called ‘Our Story’ which featured two local Syrian refugees. The refugees featured in a short film about finding their place in Wollongong and was followed by a Q&A session. This program was very successful and had a lot of interest. During the month of July, Wollongong held a Film Festival featuring films in indigenous languages from around the world sourced by Canopy, to coincide with International Year of Indigenous Languages. Vicki enquired if anyone had the most recent copy (2018) of the Australian Citizenship Test Manuals. Nobody did so she will investigate if this will be made available to Libraries.
Joelman – Blacktown Blacktown visited the Human Rights Commission in Pitt Street, Sydney and selected some images to exhibit during Refugee Week. The photos were enlarged and printed on to corflute for exhibiting. If you are interested in doing something similar, contact Leon Wild. They also held a costume exhibition of traditional Philippines national dress in partnership with a local Philippine Community Group. They are also currently displaying 150 language books from around the world.
Pauline – Parramatta Parramatta Council is opening a new branch in Wentworth Point later in the year and are about to celebrate Health Month with a variety of programs and displays.
Next meeting – SLNSW – Thursday 21st November – 9.30am