Page 55 - MDS final deliverable

4. DESIGN AND DEPLOY A MASTERCLASS SERIES
Workshops to upskill participants and their families on various skills
THE SOLUTION
MDS’ Masterclass series can provide a number of workshops to upskill families and participants on a variety of relevant topics. These workshops can be run in partnership with different organisations and provide the opportunity for participants to learn new skills that they can use for gainful employment. This could also be a possible new revenue opportunity for MDS if they charge a nominal fee for participants and families to attend. MDS is also already successfully running a hoarder’s workshop program - there is an opportunity for this to be replicated in other neighbourhoods.
Example topics include:
• How to deal with aggressive participants or family members
• Partner with organisations to train participants in hobby or employability skills training (e.g. cooking, carpentry, gardening, accounting, administration, IT,
photography, art). Partner with financial organisation to teach families and participants on how to manage their finances (on and off NDIS). Resources required: Trainers, partnerships | Existing resources: Existing MDS staff knowledge
MDS can partner with other organisations to provide expertise on relevant topics
WHY IT WILL WORK
Families and participants are upskilled
Higher functioning participants get new employment opportunities
Masterclass series
• Participants (especially PTE) have a strong desire to enrich the many different facets of their lives and themselves as individuals. They seek growth, learning and development. They want to do more in life, and so do their families. The workshops provide opportunities to better equip participants and their families with relevant skills so they can live to their fullest potential.
• Mental health participants are usually in transition and in the process of getting their life ‘back on track’. This means getting back into a routine or entering the workforce once more. They are keen to develop new skills as they may no longer be able to do work they had done previously due to the changes in their health.
• MDS is also looking for new revenue streams as NDIS makes it difficult to grow the business – the social enterprise is an opportunity to increase revenue in a way that doesn’t replace the core business, but instead compliments it. The social enterprise can also be scaled if it is successful.