VU partnered with the Western Bulldogs Community Foundation (WB Community Foundation) to expand the Sons and Daughters of the West programs for better health, to new culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities in Melbourne's west.
The tailored, community-informed health intervention programs were focused on creating greater connection with community organisations, local government associations, education and health providers, and sustainable change.
The delivery of the program at the participant level focused on how to improve positive health habits, increase mental resilience, and levels of sustainable connectedness to community. At the end of the programs, participants and families attended graduations where they celebrated their achievement in completing the programs.
The research team completed pre- and post-program community consultations with diverse communities of women for the Daughters of the West program (DOTW) and men for Sons of the West (SOTW) - the Vietnamese DOTW 2021, Vietnamese SOTW 2022, East African DOTW 2022 and African-Australian SOTW 2021 and Indian-Australian SOTW 2022. The pre-program consultations were to firstly identify the more specific needs of the communities and the post-program consultations informed opportunities for improvement.
The project involved local governments, Brimbank and Maribyrnong City Councils, and not-for-profit organisations such as the Multicultural Centre for Women's Health and the East African Women's Foundation, to engage participants in active living and healthy habits.
Findings from the projects will be used to scale and diversify the programs into the future to tackle health and wellbeing challenges as relevant to different communities.
