Coordinator of the Year - Kathi’s 2022 Highlights
The FFDC team is SO proud of Kathi for achieving the Coordinator of the Year Award for Victoria & Tasmania and becoming a national finalist. In talking to her after her win, I asked Kathi what she identifies as some of her biggest achievements as coordinator this year. Here are some of her highlights, in no particular order:
Growing our team - so far this year, we've been fortunate to grow our team by three Educators (Alyce, Jesh, and Jorit), and one staff member (Laura). Kathi loves seeing the FFDC team expand and getting to know the unique expertise each person brings to the table. These four individuals have already added so much value to Foundations. They are each going from strength to strength.
Expanding into South Australia - Kathi was deeply honoured when she was approached by South Australian Family Day Care Educators about bringing Foundations to South Australia. She has been working so hard at developing our SA service, and, while we are still waiting for the last few pieces to fall into place, being granted service approval for FFDC SA was an enormous win!
Reuniting - the 2020/2021 lockdowns were incredibly difficult for our service, especially our Educators. After being apart for so long, Kathi was thrilled to be able to see the Educators in person again! It has been so encouraging to be able to gather in person to learn as we've resumed our team training days.
Going digital - we've added a lot of new technology behind the scenes at Foundations this year, which is helping our service run more smoothly and reach more people. Some of Kathi's favourite tools we've implemented include streaming our training days via Zoom to our absent & interstate team members, building a new social media strategy, and developing our online portals for staff, Educators, and families (more on this soon!) and our new digital task management systems.
Research & relationship building - the ATO is researching a new strategy for tax reporting within the Early Childhood sector. Among other service types, the research team sought participation from ten Family Day Care services nationwide. When Kathi received the email advising her that FFDC had been selected as one of the ten FDC participants, she was eager to have this opportunity to help improve administrative practice within the sector, and to build relationships with the researchers as they work together on this new strategy.
Clearly, it's been a massive year, and it's only August! Please join me in congratulating Kathi on her win and honouring her huge achievements over the last 8 months. We can't wait to see what the rest of the year holds for Foundations, especially with our fearless leader at the helm!