Please note, program provided below is current as of the time of publication. Program details, timings and speakers are subject to change without notice. We recommend checking back regularly for the most up-to-date information.
Please note: events marked with * are by invite only. All other events and sessions are open for all Turning Point delegates
Further details coming soon
Special guest speaker to be announced.
Featuring a photography display – ‘Strength in Parenthood’.
Canapés and drinks provided.
8.15am
Registrations, Coffee & Arrivals
8.45am
Welcomes
Brave Foundation CEO Jill Roche
MCs
9.15am
Opening Address
To be announced
9.30am
Plenary Session 1:
Where Infant Safety Sits in Australia Today
Prof. Melissa O’Donnell & Sarah Wise
10.00am
Plenary Session 2: Supporting Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Families to Stay Together From the Start
Dr Jacynta Krakouer & Prof. Cath Chamberlain
10.30am
Plenary Session 3:
An International Perspective: Learnings from the UK’s Largest Young Parent Organisation
WILD Young Parents (United Kingdom)
11.00.am
Break
11.15am
Break-out Streams: Promising Practices
(Lunch break at 1.15pm, times for each stream to be determined)
Shaping Tomorrow’s Support for Young Parents
Featuring presentations by: Thriving Queensland Kids/IDAC, WILD Young Parents (UK), Newpin Australia
Trust at the Core: Relationship-based Support
Featuring presentations by: Micah Projects, St Philip’s Christian College DALE Young Parents School
Scaffolding for Success: Meeting Critical Needs First
Featuring presentations by: Hobart City Mission Small Steps, Lady Musgrave Trust/YFS Step by Step Program
Beyond the Surface: Supporting the Unseen & Unheard
Featuring presentations by: Uniting VicTas, Brave Foundation, Australian Childhood Foundation Bringing Up Great Kids
Privileging Lived & Living Experience
Featuring presentations by: Palmerston Child & Family Centre’s Young Mums Strong Mums, VACCA, Junction Australia’s The Young Parent Project
The Power of Collective Practice
Featuring presentations by: YFS Step by Step Program, Brave Foundation, Village Connect
4.00pm
Break
4.15pm
Pass the Mic
Reflections, Questions & Discussions from the Floor
5.00pm
End of Day
8.30am
Coffee & Arrivals
9.15am
Panel Discussion 1: Lived Experience: Centring Family Voices in Infant Safety
To be announced
10.00am
Panel Discussion 2: Framing the Rights of the Child
To be announced
10.45am
Break
11.00am
Pass the Mic
Reflections, Questions & Discussions from the Floor
11.45am
Closing Remarks
Brave Foundation CEO Jill Roche
MCs
12noon-1.00pm
Lunch & Networking
Connection & Creativity for Lived Experience delegates & participants
Dr Amy Gill is a freelance researcher and social policy consultant with over a decade of experience in the academic, non-profit, and government sectors. She completed a PhD at the University of Sydney in 2024. This study consisted of a three-phase mixed-methods investigation of service responses to pregnancy and parenthood among care-experienced young people in New South Wales. As a care-experienced child and family welfare specialist, reflexivity and positionality are central to her work.
Professor Catherine Chamberlain is a Trawlwoolway woman (Tasmania) and Head of the Indigenous Health Equity Unit at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne. A registered midwife and public health researcher, her research aims to identify perinatal opportunities to improve health equity across the lifecourse. She is inaugural Editor-In-Chief of First Nations Health and Wellbeing Lowitja Journal, inaugural Chief Midwifery Officer for the College of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nursing and Midwifery, and Principal Investigator for three large multi-disciplinary projects which aim to address intergenerational trauma impacting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in the perinatal period.
Dr Jacynta Krakouer (PhD Melb) is a Minang Noongar woman from southwestern Australia, living and working on Wurundjeri Country in Melbourne. She is an Aboriginal Enterprise Fellow and Aboriginal Strategy and Engagement Lead at the Australian Centre for Child Protection at the University of South Australia. Jacynta’s expertise relates to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples in child protection and out-of-home care, particularly prenatal reporting and infant removal, and cultural connection. Jacynta leads multi-jurisdictional research projects in perinatal child protection across Australia and is key leadership personnel for the national Supporting Aboriginal Families to Stay Together From the Start (SAFeST Start) Coalition.
Dr Jade Purtell is a transdisciplinary researcher focussed on out-of-home care and transitions from care working across academia and the community sector to promote young people’s participation in research, policy development and practice. Jade’s PhD project focussed on care leavers parenting through their transitions from care and identified needs for healing trauma and loss and promoting social connection in parenting support. Jade is co-convener of the International Network on Participation in Alternative Care (INPAC) and co-editor of the book ‘Children’s Rights to Participate in Out-of-Home Care: International Social Work Contexts’.
Professor Melissa O’Donnell is Deputy Director of Research at the Australian Centre for Child Protection, University of South Australia. Melissa is an internationally recognised researcher and leads a program of research on pre-birth and infant involvement in child protection. Melissa collaborates with those with lived experience, government and non-government agencies to provide evidence to inform policy and practice to improve child and family outcomes.
Renna Gayde is Bunyarinjarin, a Walbunja Woman from the Yuin Nation. Renna was made a ward of the state in ACT at age 15 and then later had her own children apprehended by authorities in WA in 2005. Renna has since committed her life to understanding systems in order to help other women navigating these same complex processes whilst healing from trauma and building safety and stability needed for families to thrive. A qualified Social Work practitioner, Renna draws on both lived and professional experiences to educate and agitate for leading practice that supports families to build, reach and maintain their own goals as parents, creating safer and healthy communities where all children are connected, cared for and cherished.
Sarah Morris is a Research Fellow and Sessional Academic in the Department of Social Work at Monash University. A qualified social worker, her professional background spans out-of-home care, mental health, disability, and men’s rehabilitation forensic practice. Informed by lived experience of out-of-home care and as a young mother, Sarah is deeply committed to advancing trauma-informed, rights-based, and co-designed approaches that centre the voices of care-experienced populations. Having personally navigated prejudice and assumptions directed towards care-experienced young parents, Sarah brings both scholarly and experiential insight to conversations on improving early intervention and addressing systemic inequalities faced by care-experienced parents.
© 2026 All Rights Reserved.
