Lifeview leading the way through innovative resident engagement

Residents living at Lifeview homes in Melbourne’s south-east are helping drive two new innovative charitable programs, keeping them engaged and spending their time doing what they have always enjoyed.

Lifeview Paying It Forward is raising funds for six local charitable causes throughout the year, while Lifeview Re-Cycle is donating restored second-hand bicycles back into the community.

Paying It Forward has to date raised over $3000 in its first four months of operation, with funds raised benefiting the Emerald Kindergarten, damaged by fire earlier this year, and the Women’s Spirit Project, which supports disadvantaged women from the Frankston and surrounding areas.

“The Paying It Forward initiative is an opportunity for our staff to nominate small, local charities in the community that are making a difference but that don’t get a lot of financial support or promotion,” Lifeview CEO Samantha Jewell said.

“There are so many groups doing wonderful work that would genuinely benefit from some extra funding, and we want to make a difference for them.

“The first two months have been amazing, with working groups set up in each Lifeview home, made up of residents and staff. They are working together to come up with various ways to raise funds, such as sausage sizzles, raffles, dress-up days and more.”

Samantha said helping residents remain connected to their communities was at the heart of the program.

“They want to give back. They have spent their whole lives supporting various causes and being connected to the community in many ways. It should not stop just because they have moved into aged care,” she said.

“This program provides residents and staff with an additional sense of purpose and the initial response has been really heart-warming.”

Emerald Pre-School Parent Advisory Group President Kate Spencer said the Paying It Forward funds received recently “will make a huge difference”.

“This funding will go towards a lot of the incursions we love to hold for the children each year,” she said.

“There are some music-based incursions and some wildlife and animal-based incursions that the educators love to run with both the three- and four-year-old groups.

“We weren’t sure if we would be able to run them this year, but this will definitely allow us to continue that curriculum for the children.”

Lifeview Emerald Glades residents regularly visit the Emerald Kindergarten, and in fact resident Elaine used to be an assistant at the pre-school.

The kinder community still remembers Elaine well, with parents visiting the pre-school recently noticing Elaine on one of her visits with Lifeview and instantly recalling her as “Mrs Morris” from their time attending as children.

Re-Cycle meanwhile is a program launched by Lifeview earlier this year, which sees male residents come together fortnightly to repair and restore pre-loved bicycles.

The men have been meeting in the shed at Lifeview Argyle Court in Chelsea, where they work with maintenance officer Robbie and social support team member Gayle.

The group repairs bicycles sourced from hard rubbish or bikes that have been donated to the program, repairing them, putting new parts on the bikes and polishing them up for donation back into the community.

“We’ve all grown up using our hands for this kind of work and to be able to reuse those skills now just gives you a little bit more engagement and enjoyment,” said Robbie, who the residents have dubbed “our leader”.

“These guys (at Argyle Court) have taken it to the next level, saying ‘give us this wheel and we’ll polish it up while you’re not here’, which is great.

“Some of the stories from these guys here might have to stay in the shed.

“Listening to their backgrounds, their childhoods and things like that, it's very nice and good to be able to give back through a program like this."

The idea for the Re-Cycle program stemmed from last year’s Lifeview staff leadership conference, where team members divided into groups and took part in an activity to build flat pack bicycles from scratch.

Staff thought it a competition at first, but once all bikes were all built and on display, it was announced the bikes would be donated to children from the Heart Kids charity.

When the kids and their parents suddenly emerged on the day, the youngsters quickly found their new bikes and were overjoyed as they rode around the room.

“That was really special and stuck with everyone in the room,” Robbie recalls.

“It was afterwards that Sam (Lifeview CEO) pulled me aside and said we want to turn this into a resident program, building bikes to donate back into the community. It’s a great idea.”

Samantha explained the importance of resident activities such as Re-Cycle in aged care.

“It’s very important for mental health and wellbeing that residents are engaging in activities that they enjoy. Things that have always brought them joy, such as working on bikes and projects, it’s a great social gathering for the men,” she said.

“The giving back to the community aspect of the program is also very important to the residents. They know these bikes are going back into the community to be cherished by people who don’t have a bike and will be enormously appreciative of the residents’ efforts.”

Argyle Court resident David has been attending Re-Cycle sessions since the beginning. He looks forward to it every fortnight and feels it is more valuable to his health and wellbeing than some may think.

“Sometimes people in places like this perhaps used to retire and sit around and do nothing,” he said.

“But now, with these programs, you’re keeping people active and engaged. Mentally and physically to keep doing things is much better for people.

“I find it very important. If you sit around and do nothing, and TV's not worth watching nowadays, these programs are very important. It keeps us interested.”

Fellow resident and Re-Cycle team member Kevin, who used to work for Toyota, agrees, saying he thoroughly enjoys the sessions.

“Absolutely I look forward to them. It’s great,” he said.

The Re-Cycle program has just expanded to Lifeview Willow Wood in Cranbourne, where 10 residents took part in the first session recently and all vowed to return the following fortnight.