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Speak Out
February 2015
Speech Pathology Australia
The day after returning from overseas I researched the
Australian Volunteers for International Development (AVID)
program. AVID is an Australian Government-funded program
that sends skilled volunteers to developing countries.
Volunteers go to a particular location on an assignment that
is designed together with a local organisation. Assignments
have specific capacity-building objectives; to build the skills,
abilities and resources of the local organisation so that when
the volunteer leaves, the work can continue.
I applied for a ten month assignment in Albay, in the
Philippines. Three months later I was training in Sydney and
preparing for departure in January 2014! My assignment was
at a large school with 3,000 students and more than 100
teachers. I was based in the Special Education Department
which has five classes – multiple disability, autism, intellectual
disability, hearing impairment and a transition class.
My goal was to build the teachers’ and parents’ capacity
to support children with communication difficulties in the
whole municipality. As there were no speech pathologists
in the region (most in the country work privately in Manila),
I had to create tools for the community that would last. As
well as running workshops for education staff and parents,
I worked alongside them helping them to use techniques to
support their child's communication. With teachers, I created
a resource CD which included assessments, information
and therapy tools. Imagine creating a speech assessment
in Filipino language, choosing targets that are appropriate
phonemically, familiar to children and culturally sensitive!
I also made the most of opportunities to have an impact
outside of my assignment. These included working with and
training several organisations that supported children with a
disability, being involved in workshops and consultations at the
local university and helping to run the Special Olympics for the
region. I even ran sessions on Gender Equality at a camp for
adolescent girls!
It was great to be able to have connections and make a
difference with individuals as well. The students at school
knew me as ‘Teacher Lars’. When asked what he is going to
do today, one of the students with autism said ‘punta Lars’
(‘go to Lars’). After school, when asked what he did today he
would say "kawat Lars" (‘play with Lars’). His mother made a
real effort to follow my advice, from modelling language with
feature
After a trip overseas
I realised I wanted live and work abroad, somewhere new and different to Australia. While I loved
my job and home in Port Augusta, South Australia, I longed to challenge myself and apply my skills as a speech pathologist in
an entirely different context. I realised volunteering was a good option as I could utilise my skills and hopefully benefit those
who are not as fortunate to have a stable economy, robust education and healthcare systems.
Change of scenery