Working with Families Experiencing Vulnerability

Susan Heward-Belle is an Associate Professor of Social Work at the University of Sydney. Her teaching and sustained program of original research focuses on driving change to create socially just gender transformative strategies to prevent and address domestic and family violence. Her cutting-edge research, particularly with men who perpetrate violence against women and children, aims to counter dominant paradigms that offer gender biased responses, particularly by institutions of the state such as statutory child protection services, police, and the courts. She contributes to knowledge, which informs public policy and professional practices, that ultimately prevent inter-personal violence. Moreover, her research focuses on developing and promoting dignity-based policy and practice. Menka Tsantefski is an academic in the School of Social Work and Community Welfare, Faculty of Health, Southern Cross University, and a researcher in the Faculty's Centre for Children and Young People. Menka's research has examined the transition to motherhood among women with histories of problematic substance use, the experiences of children affected by parental substance use, and all-of-family approaches at the intersection of alcohol and other drugs, mental health, domestic/family violence and child protection concerns. Her work, which is cross-sectoral and multi-disciplinary, has been at the forefront of service delivery. She has built evidence for interventions, designed and implemented projects for children, led developments in child-aware practice in adult services, increased collaboration between service sectors, and influenced policy and practice at the national level.

1. The context for practice with children, young people, and their families Menka Tsantefski and Susan Heward-Belle; 2. Person-centred, relationship-based practice Susan Heward-Belle, Brigid Lang-Norris, Pam O'Connor, Lauren Redmile and Susan Brown; 3. Working within and between organisational boundaries Dorothy Scott; 4. Poverty and its impacts on children and families Peter Matthewson, Paul Harris and Menka Tsantefski; 5. Attachment theory Amy Conley Wright and Peiling Kong; 6. Engaging with fathers for the care and safety of families Susan Heward-Belle and Patrick O'Leary; 7. Parenting in a new land Asukulu Bulimwengu and Pooja Sawrikar; 8. Working with parents with problematic substance use and mental health issues Sharon Dawe, Paul Harnett and Elizabeth Eggins; 9. Children in the midst of family violence Larissa Fogden, Cathy Humphreys and Menka Tsantefski; 10. Supporting children and families affected by disasters Elizabeth A. Newnham, Enrique Mergelsberg, Lauren Kosta, Katitza Marinkovic Chavez, Jonathan Bullen, Jane Nursey and Lisa Gibbs; 11. Working with families in pregnancy Jo Spangaro; 12. Working with children: a rights-based, relational approach to practice Menka Tsantefski and Mary Jo Mc Veigh; 13. Understanding young people Jioji Ravulo; 14. Parenting with intellectual disability Susan Collings and Margaret Spencer; 15. Family-led decision-making approaches with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families Lynette Riley, Sarah Ciftci and Irene Wardle; 16. Working with Māori whānau (families) Sharyn Roberts; 17. Supporting people of diverse genders and sexualities Peter Matthewson and Ives Rose; 18. Working with kinship care families Ann MacRae and Dave Vicary.