Presented by Shane Murdoch, Chief Executive, Cholmondeley

1. An NGO at the
CrossroadsHow technology is helping to meet the challenge

3. What is Cholmondeley?

4. • Incorporated Society
• Opened in 1925 as
Cholmondeley Memorial
Children’s Home
• Bequeathed by Hugh Heber
Cholmondeley
• 25,500 + children to date

6. What it does…
• Short term planned and
emergency respite care
• Community based-direct
referral
• 3-12 years
• Brokerage for additional
supports to family

7. How?
• Philosophy of Care
entrenched in child rights
• Integrated care and education
model
• Adventure Based Learning
• Identify child’s strengths
• Ensure child’s network knows
• Build resilience

8. However much a child wounds his own self
esteem, they cannot change the esteem in
which we hold them.
When that relationship is established, we can
begin.
• Adapted from David Wills (1945)

9. Sometimes it’s simply a
matter of taking a break,
making friends and having
some fun

10. • $1.75m annual budget
• 80% funded through
community fundraising
• 20% Government
contributory funding and
investments

11. February 2011

17. Our Challenges
The history of residential care
is long and storied and clearly
remains a controversial
area...(Barth, 2005)
Two main developmental
pathways:
Health
Welfare

18. In home with
minimal support
Out of system or
back home with
minimal support
Prevention/Diversion
Family Support
Family Preservation
Foster Care
Treatment Foster Care
Residential Care
Linear Model of Child and Family Services.
(Stuck et al, 2000)

19. The Social Services
Sector
• Investing in Services for
Outcomes
• Push to consolidate the
sector

20. Our Challenge
• Moving from outputs to
outcomes
• Creating an economic
argument for increased
government support
• Avoiding capture

21. Building an evidence
base
• Defining quantifiable social
outcomes
• Developing longitudinal data
• Ethically constrained
• Capacity!!
• Priority is service delivery

22. Our Approach
• Qualitative evaluation builds
the baseline
• Coding of data draws out
key outcome themes to
develop and pursue
• Start gathering the outcome
data

23. So where does IT fit in?

24. Cholmondeley Children’s
Centre
• Building is an extra set of
eyes
• When a child kicks the
building, it’s gonna kick them
back
• Children connecting with us in
between stays and staying
connected with families
• Connecting with Alumni

25. Moving to Outcomes
• Key is cost effectiveness
• Simple to use- maintained
by front of house
• Data is easy to access and
mined
• Standardised