Evaluation of the Women’s and Girls’ Emergency Centre (WAGEC) Counselling Project
December 2022
The Women’s and Girls’ Emergency Centre (WAGEC) provides emergency and medium-term accommodation and support services to families, women and children experiencing or at risk of homelessness and/or domestic and family violence.
Many of WAGEC’s clients experience difficulties accessing community-based psychological and counselling services, in particular the women and children from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds whose access to such services is impacted by their precarious visa status.
To address this issue, WAGEC obtained funding to set up and implement its own psychological and counselling service for children, adolescents and adults. ANROWS worked with WAGEC to evaluate the service.
Research aim/s
The evaluation focused on the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact, sustainability and management of the service, as well as the potential to scale up the model.
Methods
The evaluation used document analysis, surveys and interviews as its main data sources. Feedback forms were completed by clients using the service, the counsellors collected data on referral needs, and a sample of clients was interviewed concerning their experiences accessing the service and its impact on their lives.
Significance
The evaluation demonstrated the efficacy of the model for improving women’s and children’s access to psychological and counselling services. The evaluation also showed the relevance of the model to other service providers whose clients lack access to mainstream services.
Researchers
Evaluation team
Dr Peter Ninnes, Evaluation Manager, ANROWS
Katie Young, Clinical Governance Manager, WAGEC
Rebecca, Child and Young Person Psychologist, WAGEC
Lauren Hamilton, Evaluation and Partnership Manager, ANROWS
Tamsin Angus-Leppan, Research Officer, ANROWS
Celeste Koens, Research Officer, ANROWS
Dr Tran Nguyen, Project Officer, ANROWS
Alimadad Rasoli, Project Officer, ANROWS