Constable Care
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Originally conceived in 1989, the Constable Care Child Safety Foundation is a not for profit community organisation working in partnership with the Western Australia Police, to educate children and young people in primary and secondary schools across the State about safety, crime prevention, ethics and good decision making. Constable Care is a nationally registered harm prevention charity and utilises theatre-in-education, and in particular applied theatre, to deliver its education messages.
The Constable Care Child Safety Foundation tours throughout Western Australia delivering interactive theatre workshops, plays and puppet theatre programs. Based in Maylands, Western Australia, the organisation employs professional actors who visit over 700 schools a year including remote indigenous community schools. The performances are supported by curriculum-linked classroom resources and tailored to the learning needs of students from pre-primary to Year 12, covering topics such as bullying, alcohol and drug abuse, protective behaviours, cultural understanding, road safety, violence prevention and mental health. Students' change in knowledge, attitude and behavioural intent towards each topic is measured pre and post performance incursion through teacher-administered surveys developed through Constable Care's ongoing research partnerships.
As of December 2016, well over 2.5 million Western Australian children had participated in a Constable Care performance, with around 100,000 students taking part each year. The Constable Care brand celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2014 and has now performed for three generations of WA children. In July 2018, the foundation launched a road safety app for students.[1]
TRG Theatrical Response Group
In late 2013 Constable Care launched its youth brand Theatrical Response Group (TRG), a tongue-in-cheek nod to the organisation's long standing connection with WA Police. TRG Theatrical Response Group undertakes theatre workshops in WA's secondary schools using applied theatre techniques to involve students in discussion and problem-solving on serious youth issues such as cyberbullying, relationship violence and alcohol and drug abuse. The organisation uses the Forum theatre approach developed by Brazilian Augusto Boal as its methodology for engaging students, and undertakes a significant number of touring workshops as well as a smaller number of in-residence extended school interventions each year. In September 2014 the organisation commecned delivering this program in remote Aboriginal schools in the Pilbara region, placing indigenous actors and facilitators in classrooms to work with students for up to 2 weeks at a time. The organisation now delivers a significant number of these "TRG Intensive" programs in both Perth metropolitan and remote secondary schools each year.
Community mascots
The Constable Care mascots can be seen at upwards of 60 community events across Perth and Western Australia each year, including Telethon events, the Perth Christmas Pageant, Perth Royal Show, Mandurah Crab Fest, Joondalup Festival and many other metropolitan and regional events. The non-speaking mascot's role is to interact with children and families at events to provide a positive first experience of police for young children. The mascots and a trained helper undertake event walkarounds, stopping for photographs and giving away handouts such as stickers and cardboard police hats. At larger events such as the Telethon Kids Carnival, the mascot takes part in safety-themed song and dance performances on stage with actors from the Constable Care Performance Company. The Constable Care mascot was recognised at a ceremony in June 2014 at the Western Australian Police Academy for 25 years of service to the WA community, receiving the regimental number 12020 and the status of Senior Constable. At a ceremony in August 2014, then Commissioner of WA Police Karl O'Callaghan presented the Constable Care mascot with a 25-year service medal. In May 2016 Western Australia Police filmed a video featuring the Constable Care mascot dancing with uniformed officers as part of the worldwide online Running Man Challenge. The video was published on the WA Police Facebook page and has been watched over 1.3 million times. In September 2017, in recognition of Western Australian Police 100 Years of Women in Policing celebrations, a new female mascot Constable Clare was introduced to complement the existing Constable Care mascot.
Lost child services
The Constable Care Child Safety Foundation provides lost child services at the Perth Christmas Pageant, Mandurah Crab Fest, City of Perth Skyworks, Perth's Anzac Day ceremonies, Western Australia Day celebrations and many other family-oriented community events in Western Australia. The service distributes contact information stickers or armbands to families arriving at events so they can be quickly reunited with their children should they become separated, and also provides highly visible staffed family meeting points within the event to locate missing children rapidly and with a minimum of trauma.
Comfort Packs program
In 2014 Constable Care launched a Comfort Packs program in partnership with Western Australia Police. The program aims to supply frontline emergency service workers with care packs to give to children who are being temporarily relocated from their homes due to accident, emergency or increasingly as a result of crimes such as domestic violence. The backpacks are age and gender appropriate and contain necessities such as pyjamas, underwear, toothbrush and paste, soap, shampoo and conditioner, hair brush, story book, teddy bear, etc. They are available at no cost to WA Police, Fire and Emergency Services and Child Protection workers and are delivered wherever required in the State. As of December 2016, the organisation had provided over 1,300 comfort packs to children statewide.
Video productions
In 2011, the organisation released "Constable Care and the A-Grades" debut single, entitled Merry Christmas, which achieved over 20,000 views on YouTube in its first month. This was the organisation's first foray into film making and was followed by two further Christmas videos in 2012 and 2013. The organisation started working in partnership in 2014 with Edith Cowan University WA Screen Academy on a series of online interactive youth crime prevention films under the banner "Your Call", with the first (#Emilywasted) on binge drinking among teenage girls released in June 2015. Three further interactive films on young male aggression (Shirtfront), car theft (Wreck) and mental health and drug use (Pressure) were released in September 2015, December 2015 and January 2016 respectively. In 2016 the organisation introduced a secondary schools' competition process for Year 10-12 students to identify the storyline for each new film, with the winning entry then developed into the interactive film. In 2017 the organisation joined forces with the Western Australia Police SAY student film making contest to run a combined secondary school competition under a new "Your Say, Your Call" banner that allows students to create a short film of their own for judging, with the winning entry then developed into the interactive film. The winning film submission for 2017 "Bottled Up" was developed by Edith Cowan University WA Screen Academy for both 360 degree virtual reality and traditional film mediums.
Safety School
Constable Care commenced planning in late 2012 to build and operate a road and transport safety experiential learning centre for children aged 4–11 years at its site in Maylands. Thanks to the support of Lotterywest and a number of corporate sponsors, the 3,500 sqm centre was completed and opened in July 2017 and now provides a fully functioning urban streetscape for practical bike and pedestrian skills education. The centre includes working traffic signalling, rail crossing, school zone and scale buildings, a bus and train, a rail platform and working pedestrian crossing. It also incorporates an augmented reality experience on iPad minis that enables children to identify and resolve pedestrian, bike and public transport safety risks overlaid on the environment, with results tracked in real time and linked to WA curriculum education outcomes. The $1.7 million Constable Care Safety School has been operating for primary school excursion groups since October 2017, and opened for family school holiday bookings in January 2018, with up to 20,000 children and adults expected to attend each year.
Patrons
Constable Care has three official patrons who attend its events and provide advice and support to the organisation. They are Commissioner of WA Police Chris Dawson, Western Australian Chief Justice Wayne Martin and actor and comedian Peter Rowsthorn.
Board
The Board of Constable Care constitutes individuals drawn from business, academia, government, education, marketing, media, the arts and community services. The current Board Chair is Professor Carolyn Dickie, Deputy Pro Vice-Chancellor of Curtin University Business School.
CEO
David Gribble is the chief executive officer of the Constable Care Child Safety Foundation Incorporated. He took over from former CEO Vick Evans in January 2011.
Former employees
Television personality Rove McManus was once a Constable Care performer, as was film actor Mahesh Jadu.
Vick Evans was the chief executive officer of the Constable Care Child Safety Foundation Incorporated for 14 years from 1998 to early 2011. He was credited with generating corporate support and securing ongoing government funding for the program. Vick Evans was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in 2010 and died in April 2011. He was succeeded by current CEO, David Gribble.
References
- ↑ "Maylands: Constable Care Child Safety Foundation launches world-first road safety app for students | Community News Group". Community News Group. 10 July 2018. Retrieved 17 September 2018.