Medium to Long Term Residential Service

Stepping Stone House (SSH) is a “Medium to Long Term out of Home Care Residential Care Service” for 14-18 year olds of mixed gender who are generally referred from Community Services, Juvenile Justice, crisis accommodation services and sometimes self-referred. For many of these young people, their lives have been turbulent and disrupted and they have possibly never experienced a stable, safe and secure living arrangement. SSH has the opportunity to provide just that.

SSH gives young people a safe environment, where the staff can interact and engage them and work towards building a meaningful, therapeutic and non-judgemental relationship.  The house assists the young people in meeting their primary needs of food, water, shelter and safety.  From the creation of such a relationship, it is possible for the staff to assist young people to identify, understand and acknowledge secondary needs such as understanding why they have been taken into care, reasons that they cannot live at home, emotional support, understanding their behaviours, health, education, belonging and connectedness, social relationships, learning new skills, participating in new experiences and gaining access to resources in a supporting and nurturing holistic learning environment.

We aim to empower the young people with self esteem, self confidence, good health, education and motivational experiences as well as give them sporting and recreational experiences, so that they will feel comfortable re-integrating back into mainstream society as a valid member of their local community.

The service has 24-hour supervision and the staff of SSH work as a team to provide care to the young people (max 5 can be accommodated).  Each staff member is chosen because of their unique skill set and commitment to the aims and purpose of SSH.

We have pride in the fact that SSH is more than just a residential service.  It is a home like, environment where young people will be treated with respect, treated with fairness, while living in a house where a quality of life is valued and promoted.

What we provide:

•    Accommodation

•    Social skills, education and development

•    Case management and support

•    Living skills assessment and education and development including:

•    Cooking lessons and opportunities to practice cooking

•    Opportunities to practice household chores

•    Teaching and assistance surrounding budgeting and managing finances

•    Teaching and assistance about expectations of a shared living space

•    Teaching and assistance surrounding time management

•    Teaching and assistance surrounding how to create a work/life balance

•    Teaching and assistance surrounding negotiation and conflict resolution

•    Personal, internet, and social safety workshop

•    Sexual health, good nutrition and exercise, communication skills and similar workshops

•    Teaching and assistance in developing interpersonal skills, including fostering self-awareness, self-responsibility and self-reflection

•    Support and advocacy surrounding

•    Medical and needs assessment

•    Vocational and employment options

•    Healthcare and mental healthcare options

•    Family contact

•    Social, recreational and leisure options

•    Tutoring and homework help

Behavioural Support:

It is recognised at SSH that the young people have learnt skills and behaviours sometimes in order to survive the traumas that led them to not being able to live at home.  We value behaviour as a form of communication and attempt to work with young people in order to teach new ways to behave in a less destructive and negative manner.

Skills used by staff of SSH range from tertiary qualifications such as understanding adolescents, stages of change, communication, counselling, motivational interviewing skills, teaching of life skills, managing challenging behaviours and consideration of the elements of passion, understanding of and empathy with the young people, humour, professional boundaries and legislative imperatives of reporting.