Posts in Community engagement
Connection and stories as a model for empowering communities
Connection and stories as a model for empowering communities

In this post, Karina Harback shows why “Inspire Connections” offers more than just time with horses—it’s a striking example of what becomes possible when communities are empowered to respond creatively to children’s needs. Partly funded by Communities for Children in Southern Tasmania, this equine-facilitated learning program shows how intelligent support can unlock locally driven, strengths-based initiatives. As a teacher and Equine Facilitated Learning Practitioner, Karina continually adapts the program to create a responsive, safe, and relational space where students develop emotional regulation, self-awareness, and confidence—skills often out of reach in traditional classrooms. At its heart, this is a story about what happens when community, care, and connection come together - and why enabling place-based responses is key to supporting all children to thrive.

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Lived experience, Innovation, Community engagement, Service DeliveryPower to PersuadeEquine-facilitated learning, Community, Learning with horses, Children
What counts as learning? Rethinking out-of-school time with Children’s University
What counts as learning? Rethinking out-of-school time with Children’s University

In a world where even after-school chess is expected to polish a child’s critical thinking résumé, the pressure to prove every moment's utility has reshaped how we talk about education. But what if children themselves have a different idea? This post by Megan Lang explores how Children’s University challenges narrow definitions of learning, and what happens when we start listening to children’s own accounts of joy, curiosity, and connection beyond the classroom.

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Education, Lived experience, Community engagementPower to PersuadeLearning, Children, Children's University, Participation, Evaluation
The power to persuade: a tribute to Professor Gemma Carey
The power to persuade: a tribute to Professor Gemma Carey

Professor Gemma Carey passed away in November 2024 after a long illness. Alongside her distinguished academic career, she co-founded Power to Persuade in 2011 and was its co-director until 2018. She built a collaborative, volunteer-run and genuinely co-produced enterprise with extensive reach and influence that continues to promote understanding and communication across four key groups of stakeholders involved in designing, implementing, studying and navigating social policy – government, academics, the community sector, and people whose lives are directly affected by it. In co-founding Power to Persuade, Gemma made a notable and lasting contribution to research and practice in social policy in Australia and internationally. Here, five people who were part of that journey – Kathy Landvogt, Susan Maury, Sue Olney, Sophie Yates and Tanya Corrie - reflect on her legacy.

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Advocacy, Community engagementPower to PersuadePolicy advocacy, policy problem, co-production
Colombian transitional justice: the need for prioritizing local voices in peacebuilding.
Colombian transitional justice: the need for prioritizing local voices in peacebuilding.

The term ‘transitional justice’ encompasses a wide range of initiatives and mechanisms to address legacies left by human rights atrocities committed amidst situations of armed conflict or in transitions from autocratic to democratic rule.    Mechanisms like the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, The International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda or the Former Yugoslavia (ICTR/ICTY) or Timor Leste’s Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation in East Timor (CAVR in Portuguese) are among some of the most internationally known transitional justice processes. In this blog post Dr Louis Monroy-Santander explains the need to prioritise local voices in peacebuilding.

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Community engagement, Creating using evidence, Policy and governance, PoliticsPower to Persuadesocial justice, data and evidence for advocacy, social inequalities