Connecting to Country in our Care Communities

CareerTrackers is a national non-profit organisation that aims to create pathways and support systems for Indigenous young adults to attend and graduate university with industry experience and amazing mentors.

Opal HealthCare has been working with CareerTrackers since 2019 when the first three interns started with the Communications and Community Engagement, People and Culture and Clinical Services teams. Opal HealthCare now has seven interns working in our Sydney Home Office and four of our Care Communities.

As a part of our internship, we have been working on a project to increase the understanding that our residents and team have about the traditional culture of the land that they are living and working on. We have been researching the history and culture that flows through the land that our residents call home, to teach and bring awareness to the importance of the land in Aboriginal culture. This knowledge is being presented in poster format, with one unique poster for every Care Community which will be framed and displayed so that everyone living, working or visiting can learn about the traditional custodians of the land.

The artwork for the project has been created by Kim, one of our interns who is studying Visual Communication at WSU. It’s designed to tell a story about our residents and capture the attention of people in our Care Communities, with bright colours and detailed digital designs.

Kim tells the story of our elders’ journey through meeting places representing our Care Communities. Each Care Community has a unique design focusing on Water, Parklands, Architecture or Geography. Aboriginal art is created to tell a story, so for these posters Kim used traditional symbols that are common in aboriginal art, the four lines represent the journey our residents go through and the circles linking them together represent meeting places being our Care Communities.

We are incredibly excited to share this project with all of our Care Communities.

- Tahnie, CareerTrackers Intern.