Christian Barwell’s organisation Up&Over offers hundreds of teenagers and adults with disabilities on the Northern Beaches the opportunity to build confidence and create meaningful relationships.
One take away from the pandemic is that we are now all aware of how socialisation is crucial to individual development. Being connected matters.
Precisely around this time, Christian Barwell, a Collaroy local, founded Up&Over, a grassroots organisation supporting people with disabilities by arranging fun and engaging social outings and trips.
“Social support and disability are notions often underappreciated, but we have had tremendous success with building people’s confidence and building stable friendships that are meaningful,” Christian says.
“People grow up and leave school or change their workplace, and we have found social groups to be a really stable place for people to come when they are going through a lot of changes. They have the same friends, the same carers, and we are doing something fun as well.
“The inspiration for me to get into disability work is my younger sister Emma.”
After years of volunteering with a local organisation doing disability support, it became apparent that there were a few gaps.
“Organisations were losing sight of the needs of the community. They went a bit more corporate, and the families around the Northern Beaches were being let down and not listened to,” Christian explains. That’s how Up&Over came to be.
“When we think of any challenges or barriers, we go up and over. Up and over can be used for sign language easily as well, so it relates to a lot of the participants we support,” Christian elaborates.
This community-based organisation does it all: nights out, bowling, mini-golf, day trips and even holidays. In fact, at the
time of this interview, Christian had just returned from their first trip overseas to Fiji. And he is taking another group next week.
“We get a lot of our activity ideas from our participants. We put in our own research into what looks good, and we chat with the participants to match up as best as we can what their interests are and what can be offered over there. Fiji, for our first international trip, was a really nice place to go. So friendly and welcoming. Also, the flight time was good, not too long.”
Christian and the team have big plans ahead, with Japan or Singapore hopefully on the cards for next year. They also do weekends away to places like Port Stephens, Kiama, the Gold Coast or Cairns.
Currently, the organisation has three age groups: the teenage group, youth from 18 to 30 years old, and an adults’ group above that. All of the groups have at least one activity on the weekends.
“Each group has probably a pool of 30 or 40 participants, and the activities generally get the interest of about 10 to 12 people for each of the days,” Christians says.
“The participants are supported on a one-to-three, one staff to three participants, or a one-to-one ratio, depending on the level of support that they need.”
To make sure the staff are well- equipped, they run regular training around techniques like active support, behaviour support, and epilepsy.
“We really focus on active support, getting to know the person for who they are and not generalising their disability,” Christian adds.
“In our younger programme, it has helped teenagers keep their minds open to new friendships and experiences. Stigma certainly stretches into the disability sector as well, and we have seen how beneficial it is [having diverse groups] to keep people’s minds open.”
By Patricia Alonso