Plumtree’s award-winning Now & Next enables children with disability and their families to thrive. A global benchmark analysis shows how far the program has come.
We are passionate about innovation and transforming lives. Developed in-house and launched in a group setting during 2016, Now & Next builds skills and enables parents to achieve positive outcomes for the entire family.
It established a peer network connecting families to learn from and inspire each other. Alumni have been trained to become peer workers in roles such as running courses, research, and planning with families at Plumtree.
Now & Next shows that peer networks and peer workers are a new resource for the future. Plumtree Research Analyst and Peer Worker Mogi Bayasgalan has been tracking the program’s achievements.
A growing international program
Beginning with three groups in 2016 at Plumtree’s Sydney centre, a total of 85 group programs have been hosted in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Finland for 773 graduates to date. 42% of attendees were from Culturally and Liguistically diverse background, and fathers were well represented at 23%.
Enabling greater accessibility, 48% of the groups were held online while 52% were held face-to-face. Now & Next successfully transitioned to a fully online program during the COVID pandemic.
Setting a vision and goals
Using Pictability, an innovative visioning tool developed in-house, participants learned to develop short and long-term goals in three categories: for the child, the family, and themselves.
Examples included having a child become more independent in daily routines, or begin to communicate. Common family goals involved creating more quality time together. Better well-being and fitness were popular personal goals.
Now & Next impact
The results are encouraging. Across the three categories, close to 90% of participants’ goals were achieved in the face-to-face sessions and over 80% in the online sessions. Answers to questionnaires were also positive and included:
- Increased empowerment, skills and knowledge, agency and hope at the program’s end;
- Increasing participant satisfaction across the eight sessions. A uniform dip during the sixth session were due to some personal topics that were a part of the content;
- A better sense of wellbeing.
For more detailed information, download the full Now & Next Program 2016-2022 Global Benchmark Analysis by Mogi Bayasgalan. Read more about the external evaluation undertaken by Murdoch Childrens Research Institute.
Collaboration for the future
An earlier version of the analysis was presented at a symposium attended by Australian and international academics, parents of children with a disability, and professionals from early intervention and disability support services.
Now & Next was well received, and we are working with them further to develop the program and other family capacity-building strategies.
Want to collaborate with us? Get in touch.
Find out more about Now & Next.
