Community and industry links
The School of Social and Political Sciences has established many vital links with community and industry groups in Australia. Some of the most notable include:
VicHealth
Over the last few years, the School has established strong links and a productive working relationship with VicHealth - the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation. VicHealth funds a number of research projects in the School and a number of mutual interests have developed, including: partnerships, social connectedness and civic engagement, and the linkages between policy, services, communities and health.
Jenny Lewis, Mark Considine and Jo Barraket have a project grant from VicHealth titled 'Social connectedness and policy development: modelling strategies and measures', which is examining the key explanations of social connectedness, and then explicitly linking together community engagement, forms of policy development, and impacts on health. This has lead to an ARC Linkage grant application which is currently under consideration.
Brotherhood of St. Laurence
The Brotherhood of St Laurence is a Melbourne-based community organization which was established in the 1930s by an Anglican priest Fr Gerard Tucker. Its major commitment of resources to applied social research has made it unique among NGOs concerned with ending poverty in Australia. In 2004, the Department entered into a partnership with the BSL to create a joint appointment linking the Department's Master of Social Policy coordinator position with the post of General Manager of the Research and Policy Centre at the BSL. Through research, seminars, internships and teaching partnerships this unique venture in Australia's welfare sector has become a key platform for facilitating the knowledge transfer envisaged by the University's Growing Esteem.
Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV)
The Municipal Association of Victoria is one of the two key industry partners involved in the School's new ARC Linkage project on "Resettling Visible Migrants and Refugees in Rural and Regional Australia". The project was launched in February 2009, and examines the interrelated social, economic and political factors that shape the resettlement experiences of recent visible migrants and refugees who live primarily in rural and regional Victoria.
The Municipal Association of Victoria is the peak representative and advocacy body for Victoria's 79 councils. The MAV and the Municipal Association Act 1907 anointed the MAV the official voice of local government in Victoria. Today, the MAV is a driving and influential force behind a strong and strategically positioned local government sector. MAV represents and advocates the interests of local government, lobbies for a "fairer deal" for councils, raises the sector's profile, ensures its long-term security and provides policy advice, capacity building programs and insurance services to local government.
Victorian Multicultural Commission (VMC)
The Victorian Multicultural Commission is one of the two key industry partners involved in the School's new ARC Linkage project on "Resettling Visible Migrants and Refugees in Rural and Regional Australia". The project was launched in February 2009, and examines the interrelated social, economic and political factors that shape the resettlement experiences of recent visible migrants and refugees who live primarily in rural and regional Victoria.
The Victorian Multicultural Commission provides independent advice to the Victorian Government to inform the development of legislative and policy frameworks as well as the delivery of services to our culturally, linguistically and religiously diverse society. The VMC is the main link between Victoria's culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities and the Government, conducting more than 50 community consultations each year. The VMC's objectives and functions, as specified in the Multicultural Victoria Act (MVA) 2004, are to: promote access by Victoria's culturally and linguistically diverse communities to retain and express their social identity and cultural inheritance; promote unity among Victoria's culturally and linguistically diverse communities; and promote a better understanding within Victoria of Victoria's culturally and linguistically diverse communities.
Transitional Labour Markets in Australia
The Centre for Public Policy at the University of Melbourne is currently in the second year of a 2 year research project on Transitional Labour Markets in Australia in which important links with the broader community and industry accompany accompany conventional academic research support from the Australian Research Council.
In this project, the National Institute of Economic and Industry Research; the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) and the Brotherhood of St Laurence are Project Partners representing the economic and community sectors. These bodies not only augment the core funding obtained from the ARC Linkage Grant but in addition, these broader perspectives ensure that the project addresses issues and produces reports which cover critical contemporary issues in relation to policy formulation in the labour market.
The project takes as its initial premise the idea that traditional concepts of employment, based on the full-time male breadwinner model, are no longer relevant with a new approach required which recognises and integrates key transitions across the life course.