Federal Member for Bonner Ross Vasta has visited LEAD Childcare Tingalpa to congratulate them on receiving a Most Improved Service award for their outstanding work this year, and to discuss their work helping families transition to the new Child Care Subsidy.

The centre received the award out of 16 LEAD childcare services across Queensland at LEAD’s management end of year conference.

“As only three awards are given each year, this was a very meaningful award for all of us at LEAD Childcare Tingalpa,” Centre Director Katrina Bira said. 

“We received the award as an acknowledgement for myself and the educators here for all the hard work that has gone into making LEAD Childcare Tingalpa into a welcoming, inspiring centre for children, families, and the community.

“Our teaching teams use an emergent curriculum which follow children's interests and ideas. Children's interests are encouraged and future learning opportunities are presented in a way that sparks children's sense of curiosity and wonder. Through our extensions and support children gain confidence to explore their world and take safe risks.

“Children's learning is recorded on our online learning community, Storypark. Storypark allows families to be involved in their child's learning journey, which enhances and improves educational outcomes for children. Our educators and families become co-learners in the child's development.”

Mrs Bira said LEAD Childcare Tingalpa had helped their families transition to the new Child Care Subsidy by making information available on Storypark.

“We also display posters through the service as updates come to hand and have information pamphlets for the parents to take home and read. We also offer one-on-one meetings for families to help them on a case-by-case basis if they require additional individual support,” Mrs Bira said.

Families have until 2 July 2018 to update their details or risk missing out on the new subsidies. More information is available at https://www.education.gov.au/ChildCarePackage.

Makeables Tingalpa has invited local businesses to help provide valuable job skills and experience to people with disability.

Makeables, an innovation of Multicap, is a not-for-profit disability employer that provides employment, job skills and lasting working relationships for people with a disability by delivering outstanding packaging and supply chain solutions.

Local businesses in need of manual assembly, packing, or finishing services—such as packaging, bag sealing and labelling—are encouraged to contact Makeables to see what services are available to them.

Federal Member for Bonner Ross Vasta today visited Makeables to celebrate their recent partnership with local childcare photography business Little Images.

“I was happy to help connect Makeables with Little Images recently,” Mr Vasta said.

“It’s great to see businesses like Little Images taking up Makeables’ services. Makeables provides life-changing skills and training to its employees and I’m proud to support them.”

Multicap business manager Joshua Walsh thanked Mr Vasta for his assistance and said Makeables employees and Little Images had benefitted from the recent arrangement.

“This work gives our employees the opportunity to challenge themselves and overcome hurdles they may have thought impossible. They contribute and solve issues, and we encourage all of them to practice continuous improvement,” Mr Walsh said.

“Outsourcing has a marvellous, positive impact on business. We enable our clients to take on product lines and explore new income streams, even though they may be at capacity in their existing space or personnel capacity.”

“Our clients build long-lasting relationships, and our supported employees feel valued, enjoy having meaning, and use their new self-confidence to grow in their personal lives.”

Little Images owner Leigh Farley said Makeables had done great work for them assembling a promotional mailout.

“We run campaigns sending out letters to prospective clients, and when we heard about Makeables and what they are doing we wanted to be a part of the program,” Mr Farley said.

“Makeables employees folded letters and brochures for us, and inserted them into a windowed envelope, along with a chocolate drink so people could read over everything with a nice cup of hot chocolate.

“It makes such a difference to their lives, being able to get back into the workforce with Makeables, which is helping so many people. If there is anyone else out there with a business—big or small—that could use this service, I would recommend they give Joshua a call.”

Some of the competitive advantages of using Makeables include:

• Charges are typically half of the employment costs clients would have if they do it themselves;

• By using Makeables facilities, clients can scale up without the capital outlay for warehousing space;

• Makeables can operate clients’ machinery but with their charge this is typically 40–50% lower than a casual employee;

• Supporting people with a disability gains ethical value and builds corporate social responsibility.

Some of Makeables’ current activities include processing cotton tags and flock tags for the agriculture industry, operating machinery fabricating steel handles for Thunder box who supply tool boxes to Bunnings, and applying labels for Youfoodz.

A much-needed upgrade of bathroom facilities at C&K Tingalpa & District Kindergarten has been completed thanks to a $6,348 grant provided through the Australian Government’s Stronger Communities Programme.

Federal Member for Bonner, Ross Vasta, said he was proud to have helped the not-for-profit community kindergarten secure the grant for local families.

“I congratulate the staff and parents at Tingalpa C&K for fundraising the money needed to cover the remainder of the project costs. It goes to show the strong community support behind Tingalpa C&K,” Mr Vasta said.

The Stronger Communities grant went toward an upgrade of the only adult toilet at the kindergarten that staff and parents can access. This has saved the kindergarten in plumber call out fees.

The kindergarten has also installed a new hot water system using the grant, which has decreased their water costs.