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Elanne is the Volunteer Coordinator for the Shoalhaven area in Illawarra Shoalhaven Local Health District and is based in the beautiful south coast town of Berry. Recently she participated in training presented by Eastern Palliative Care in Victoria on ‘Train the Trainer – Developing a Volunteer Biography Program’. 

A few months ago, EPC in collaboration with Palliative Care NSW offered a scholarship to attend this training to palliative care volunteer services in NSW that were interested in starting a biography service. Elanne was the lucky recipient of this scholarship and rather than having to travel to Melbourne she was able to join in online.

“It was a great opportunity to get a Biography Program underway in the Illawarra and Shoalhaven. It is something we’ve been wanting to do for years but I didn’t have the knowledge to know where to start,” Elanne said.

The training was conducted by the very engaging and knowledgeable Krystal Wallis, Program Development and Volunteer Services Manager for EPC.

“The training was a mixture of pre-reading, activities and online training and discussion,” said Elanne, “there were people from all across Australia participating so it made for some very interesting discussion and sharing of ideas. There was a strong emphasis that giving a person an opportunity to reflect on their life is just as important as the resulting book”.

Already they have a group of ten very keen volunteers who would like be involved in the program. Elanne and her colleague from the Illawarra, Cynzia Dei-Cont, will be holding the first Biography training with them in mid-October with the aim of having the program up and running before the end of the year.

“Recording a person’s life story is a wonderful gift for our clients and their loved ones. We believe that the volunteers involved will also find it to be a hugely enriching and enjoyable. This will be a very exciting addition to our service.”

EPC were the first volunteer service in Australia to have a biography program and have developed comprehensive training packages for services who wish to begin offering biography to their clients. Click here to learn more about EPC ‘s ‘Train the Trainer – Developing a Volunteer Biography Program’ training.

Photo: (L-R) Shoalhaven Community Palliative Care volunteers Robyn Bean and Les Tasker, and Volunteer Coordinator Elanne Thompson at a recent community expo.