Emerge Stories

It has been a roller coaster year where we celebrated opening our long-awaited 24/7 refuge and had to grapple with the effects of COVID-19, which has altered how we have worked with the women and children we support, and how we work as staff and volunteers. While challenging, we have been greeted with enormous opportunities to become more flexible and reach more women and children than ever.

Getting the chance to exercise with your mum is not necessarily what every young child wants but for Lilly*, it is the best news ever.

Emerge is one of 15 organisations especially chosen by StreetSmart to receive funding to be spent on the mental and physical wellbeing of staff.

Emerge applauds the Victorian 2020/21 budget, saying it is a move towards equity and provides many opportunities to ensure that women who been so impacted by COVID-19 are not further left behind.

Jakob is looking forward to 25 December. He and his family are Muslim and don’t celebrate Christmas but he knows how important the day is to the other children he is surrounded by at Emerge’s refuge.

Clare’s reaction to Emerge’s story inviting supporters to join them on Wednesday 25 November to Walk Against family Violence: “I’m in” she wrote in a message to us.

The past year has been like no other but as far as Paula Westhead, Executive Officer is concerned, much of the success in continuing through lockdown and coping with coronavirus has been due to the largesse of volunteers, the community and business.

Staying in touch despite the lockdown has been Emerge’s mantra this year. This was particularly the case with its outreach program which has not been able to work directly with as many women and children as usual yet still found different ways to connect.

Known as the ‘shadow pandemic’, the incidence of family violence has increased over the past year, noticeably during May and June 2020.

A three-year partnership with Kingston City Council has resulted in many youngsters become school-ready and more attuned to the school routine after years of being traumatised by family violence.

It has been a roller coaster year where we celebrated opening our long-awaited 24/7 refuge and had to grapple with the effects of COVID-19, which has altered how we have worked with the women and children we support, and how we work as staff and volunteers. While challenging, we have been greeted with enormous opportunities to become more flexible and reach more women and children than ever.