Welcome and introduction

Geri Sumpter

Welcome everybody, welcome to our Be You Virtual Conference 2023. My name’s Geri Sumpter I’m the Head of Be You Delivery at Beyond Blue and Be You and I'm delighted to have you all join us today. So, we’re here to talk about the theme for the conference which is building our capacity to thrive. So, we do have some subthemes to the conference as well, we’re going to be talking about educator wellbeing, resilience and diversity and inclusion because all of these together really talk about that capacity to thrive.

We've got a very exciting program, we've got 13 sessions over 2 days. We’ve got 5 of those sessions today and we’ve got a new feature for our virtual conference for anyone that’s joined us before, we've actually got some virtual consultant booths. So, at the consultant booths you’ll be able to meet one of our fabulous Be You Consultants, have a conversation with them and ask any question that you've got and our virtual booth will be open after our opening keynote and for the rest of the day.

The conference is as usual led by a range of experts and I'm going to be delighted soon to introduce you to our first keynote speaker Dr. Kelly-Anne Allen and Dr. Kelly Anne is an Associate Professor at Monash University.

As we do get started today, I’d like to Acknowledge the Lands that I'm joining from and Acknowledge the Wurundjeri People of the Eastern Kulin Nation. I’d like to pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging. I’d also like to extend these respects for all of the Lands that all of you are joining from today and I really welcome you to pop the details of the Lands that you're joining from in the chat. I know that it's really exciting as we do these conferences to see where everyone is coming from and think about all of the Lands and that connection to Country that we have. I’d also like to share something that I've been looking at recently and that is around the seasons of the First Nations People's and with the Eastern Kulin Nation seasons we're now heading into what we call the wombat season and this runs from April to July and the wombat season’s described as follows which I just find just really brings a connection to, to what happens as we change through those seasons.

So, when morning mist cover the land, nights become longer and wombats emerge from their burrows it comes into waring season and it's a really beautiful way to sort of think about this and you can go onto the Bureau of Meteorology site and have a look at some of the different seasons around the country. I’d also like to share that's Beyond Blue acknowledges their intention to contribute to National Reconciliation with a Reconciliation Action Plan and really thinking about that connection to the Countries that we're all joining from.

I’d now also like to introduce you to someone very special to us here at Be You, she's the Chair of Beyond Blue and the former Prime Minister of Australia and that is the Honourable Julia Gillard and as you’ll no doubt realise Julie has a very busy calendar and unfortunately she won't be able to join us in person today but she has recorded a message for as which is super special and I'm really happy to be able to present this for you now.

Hon. Julia Gillard

It's wonderful to have the opportunity to talk with you today and to be part of what I'm sure will be another productive Virtual Conference. Coming together like this to share our experience is such an important way to learn and grow but it's also a chance to decompress. A lot has been asked of educators these past few years and you continue to face immense pressure with heavy workloads and increasing complexity of need within your learning communities. Children and young people are growing up in a volatile, challenging world with rising uncertainty and stress. As educators you absorb a lot of that stress, acting as touchpoints of stability as your students navigate their way through choppy waters. Your support is critical, not only for their learning and development but also their mental health and wellbeing. I want to take this opportunity to thank you for the difference you are making in the lives of many, but I know that you're endeavours don't come without cost. It's fitting that this year's conference theme is building capacity to thrive because now more than ever we need to build that capacity, not just for children and young people but for you yourselves. In order of your classrooms to thrive you must have enough in the tank. You must be able to bring your whole self to work. Prioritising your own needs first may seem counterintuitive when you’re juggling competing demands at work and at home, but you cannot thrive if you're running on empty. There is no more important job than looking after your own mental health and wellbeing when we're thriving we go beyond simply existing. The writer Maya Angelou said her mission in life was not merely to survive but to thrive and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humour and some style.

When we thrive, we build deep reserves of resilience that provide the capacity to grow. While thriving will look different for everyone what I've learnt through my many decades of public life is that holding fast your own values, your sense of purpose can help guide you through challenging times. I've also found that having clear boundaries and knowing when to say no can help you recharge and gain perspective. It's important too that you view discipline and resilience not as passive or innate character traits but as muscles that grow stronger the more you work them. I know I've certainly given mine a fair old work out over the years and I'm sure you have too, particularly in this post-pandemic era but thriving isn't just about building individual resilience. It's about creating work cultures the promote wellbeing, nurture relationships and embrace diversity giving you autonomy to thrive in your roles. That's why Be You exists, to support every child, young person, educator and family to achieve their best possible mental health by offering accredited professional learning resources, online events and expert Be You Consultant support.

If you haven't already I encourage you to look at be You’s Educator Wellbeing Guide on the Be You website which has a range of helpful information about how you can look after your wellbeing at work. But we also believe systemic changes across the sector are necessary to build educators’ capacity to thrive. We’re constantly talking with governments about reform to the education system in a number of areas you've told us matter to you. Things like paid time to receive ongoing professional development, increased full-time equivalent allocation to give you enough time and resources to support a whole-setting approach to mental health and wellbeing, and ensuring all pre-service educators receive mental health and wellbeing education so that they start their careers with knowledge and confidence in this critical area. These measures will all help to build capacity to thrive, creating positive inclusive and resilient learning communities.

Finally, I want to leave you with what I believe is the secret ingredient for human thriving and that is purpose. I mentioned it before but let me stress, when we have purpose and meaning in our lives, we have the potential to flourish. I can think of no greater purpose than moulding this next generation of young learners, you should all be very proud.

So, thank you all for your hard work, all the best with the conference.

Geri Sumpter

I’m sure you’ll agree it’s wonderful to have someone of Julia’s standing in our community speaking with such insight about the pressure she knows that you as educators are experiencing and that she sees and appreciates your wellbeing needs as you help support learner’s mental health and wellbeing. And I know that I'm grateful to her for giving us such a personal insight into what thriving has looked like in her life, we’ve had a bit of insight but it's nice to hear directly from her. Especially her thoughts I thought on making sure we don't run on empty and that our resilience and discipline muscles grow when we give them a workout. But as Julia said that whilst we know self-care is important for thriving Be You is also talking to government about creating the systematic changes you need to build your capacity to thrive. So, with Julia we at Be You are advocating for you wherever and whenever we can, sending the message to governments that whether you're in pre-service or an experienced educator, you want and need help to support your own mental health and help you to feel confident in your ability to support children and young people's mental health.

And while we’re on the subject of mental health support let’s consider the potential impact of us on what we talking about today. So, we can recognise that talking about mental health can bring up experiences that can be difficult and so it’s important as we go through the conference to think about any support you may need. It maybe just that you need to take a break, it maybe that you could reach out to a trusted colleague or a friend for a bit of a debrief or a chat, or it maybe that you could contact one of the support services listed in the chat but this is a really helpful sort of checklist or reference point for any of those mental health services and support that we encourage you to be aware of, keep your knowledge of it because you never know when you may need to share these with others as well.

I want to give you a little bit of information now about Be You. Be You is a national mental health and education initiative. It's for educators and Be You is obviously the organiser with this conference. Be You is delivered by Beyond Blue on behalf of the Australian Government and it's also delivered with our fantastic delivery Partners headspace and Early Childhood Australia. Be You aims to help educators support the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people and their own mental health, and our vision is that every learning community is positive, inclusive and resilient and a place where every child, young person, educator, and family can achieve their best possible mental health. We do have a broad range of offering as Julia was starting to outline to you. For educators we've got online professional learning, we've got fact sheets, we've got interactive sessions and events where you can get to meet our fabulous Consultant workforce and we’ve got plenty of other resources there on our website for you.

For early learning services and schools we have tools and processes to help you to implement a whole learning community approach to mental health and wellbeing and that can be really supported by our Be You Consultants who you can meet and ask some questions of join those virtual booths that I mentioned today, but they're also there to meet you as a learning community as well and help you to really guide your implementation of all things Be You. Be You is also completely free it's available to every educator, every early learning service and every school in Australia. We want to make sure that you do get a chance to ask questions during this session as well so please feel free to pop your questions in the chat and you'll also find in that space a lot of the links to some of the resources and those tools that I've just mentioned as they get referenced throughout the conference too. So, I’ve given you a bit of detail about the conference, as I said it's all-around building capacity to thrive and we know that learning communities can grow and flourish when resilience is developed, educated wellbeing is prioritised and diversity is celebrated.

So, when we’re looking at resilience we’re talking about building capacity towards and the resilience and recovery journey of a learning community. For educator wellbeing we need to prioritise wellbeing to build capacity so that educators can flourish and thrive. And with diversity and inclusion we need to build that capacity to connect and create inclusive learning communities. So, on day one we’re going to be looking at what's thriving means to each of us. We’re going to be thinking about giving you an overview of each of those subthemes of the conference so that's resilience, educator wellbeing, and diversity and inclusion and how these relate to the themes, so this is really scene setting for then what comes tomorrow. And we’re also going to be looking today at how personal growth supports mental health and wellbeing and develops adaptability and a growth mindset and how it helps us to build that ability to build connections across our diverse communities.

When we get into day 2 of the conference tomorrow, we're going to be giving you tools and resources to put this theory into action. We want to make this really practical for you so that you can actually take some steps back with your learning communities. The sessions tomorrow will adopt a more interactive approach, with the inclusion of master classes and sharing sessions from learning communities who are successfully already implementing Be You in their curriculums. We want you to have the opportunity to share and learn from each other as well, we know that we can all benefit from conversations. So, we're going to be having some poles throughout the sessions, we do have that chat function where you can share your reflections, your thoughts, your ideas and we’re there to have your questions answered either in the moment through our fabulous behind the scenes workforce, or we can get back to you with some more comprehensive answers to those questions after the conference. We’d also love you to be sharing about the conference across your socials, so please feel free to pop any of your reflections and share those across your social media platforms as well. When you are sharing within our chat functions please remember to consider the confidentiality, privacy and other self-care as well as your own when you are sharing, and should you need any technical support our IT support phone number will be available in that chat and can be sorted at any stage as well.

This conference is being recorded, the benefits of this is so that you can watch it again and again and you can share this with your colleagues. All the recordings will be available on our website within around 4 weeks’ time, and we really do encourage you to share your learnings and think about any sessions you may want to revisit back in your learning communities as well. You'll receive a certificate of participation for joining us today and this will be emailed to you after the event, and if you’re in New South Wales or the ACT then the conference is a New South Wales Education Standards Authority, that's NESA, and an ACT Teacher Quality Institute so TQI it is an accredited event to those two bodies. More information can be found on our conference webpage around what that accreditation looks like and means for you. As we head into the conference now, we're just going to take a quick stretch break while we reset for our keynote speaker Kelly-Anne Allen, so please don't go anywhere but take that opportunity for your first stretch of the day.

End transcript.