Dear St James Parishioners,

We are a group of Occupational Therapy students from the Australian Catholic University (ACU). As part of our unit (Occupational Therapy and Community-Centred Practice), we have reached out to St James to co-design a project proposal to an issue of importance to the community.
Occupational therapy looks at the everyday activities that are important to people - the things we want and need to do - and ensures that they can participate in those activities to the fullest. For this unit of study, we are working with the St James community to create a project that will be inclusive of as much of our community as possible.
We have chosen to reach out to the St James community as it has a vibrant population that is always engaged and invested in creating the most inclusive and welcoming community possible. We want to aid in this work through this project proposal development.

Some examples of the type of project proposals we could work with you to develop are:
• A proposal to develop a new program to meet the needs of your members
• A proposal to redesign an indoor or outdoor space to incorporate the principles of universal design to be accessible to all members of the community (e.g. wheelchair accessible spaces, quiet spaces for children with sensory processing difficulties)
• A proposal for a targeted advocacy strategy related to a specific issue
• A proposal for a health promotion activity related to a specific community health need (e.g. establishing a community veggie garden)
• A proposal for an organizational or community training initiative to increase the skills and capacities of participants

The proposal will be related to the parish as a community and can be specific to our church and congregation (e.g. creating a new ministry to address a need in the parish) or could be more broad and applicable to the wider community as well (please see examples below).

We invite you to reflect on your experiences within the community of St James - our strengths and capacities, and concerns and needs of our community.

Thank you for your time and we look forward to working with you.
Sincerely,
Miriam Ceff, Diane Sia, Rhiannon Tenace, Erika Villegas and Benjamin Ware

For further questions, please contact Diane via email at diane.sia@myacu.edu.au 




Potential project proposals:
-Community vegetable garden
-Program to reach out to families with children with disabilities/disability group meetings
-Vocational training/job readiness and mentoring for young adults and adults seeking work
-Addressing mental health needs within the community
-Establishing a program to support new volunteers to reduce high volunteer turnover