Tyler Redway
AFTER 24 years as a carer and 15 years of looking after two girls with disability, Serena Starke has said Mount Gambier was the worst town to try and find both Aboriginal and disability services over her total time as a carer.
Ms Starke said her own children were both Aboriginal and had a disability, while she added her grandchildren were also finding it hard during their time at school.
She also suggested that her grandchildren were not the only ones who wanted to learn more about Indigenous culture such as the language, the ceremonies and the way of cooking.
“The Indigenous kids in this town are having hard times at school, they don’t fit in and they love being bare-footed and out bush,” Ms Starke said.
“Why isn’t there another building similar to a Special Ed class where the Indigenous kids can go to be with their own kind, talk their language and cook their own way?”
She said this sort of support for Indigenous people is needed mainly in high school which she added was the area struggling the most.
Ms Starke said she and her husband wanted to become foster carers because they had always loved kids and wanted to share their lives and skills with the foster children they have raised over the years.
“We have had many foster kids over the years and it’s challenging, but the laughter outweighs the challenges,” Ms Starke said.
“It’s great to have them in a safe secure home where they’re not going to be moved, they’ve settled down in the end and they are just absolutely fabulous kids.”
Ms Starke said she had looked for a mentor to take her current foster kids out for activities, which ended up taking her two years with no knowledge of where to find one.
She added she only found out a short while ago that Melaleuca School had services she had never even known to exist.
“I have only just found out there is an Aboriginal worker at the education system department down Commercial Street,” Ms Starke said.
“We have the Pangula Medical Centre but if there is something more serious, where do we go for that?”
Ms Starke also mentioned her frustration with the lack of youth groups for Aboriginal and disabled children and said there isn’t much information even if there were groups available.
“We’re not being told anything and there are no brochures to say there’s a youth group for disabled children,” she said.
“These kids know they’re different but let them go and mix with their own kind, I don’t care if mainstream people mix in too.”
Ms Starke said she would be interested in contacting Enhanced Lifestyles for more discussion and to see what they may be able to do to help the situation.
“I’m quite willing to go to meetings and standing up to do the leg work,” she said.
“I’m just trying to get my own work up and running to help my kids.”
