Celebrating three decades of companionship for older Australians.
The Community Visitors Scheme is a national program, funded by the Australian Government, aimed at reducing social isolation for older Australians living in residential aged care or at home alone. It’s an amazing program that relies on the time, generosity and companionship of volunteer visitors, to regularly visit and connect with older recipients. This creates a wide range of positive benefits for both visitor and recipient. And it’s fun too.
The scheme was created in 1992 and is celebrating thirty years of operation.
We are proud to have delivered the Community Visitors Scheme throughout Northern NSW for over twenty years. In that time, we have been matching volunteers with recipients from Tweed to Grafton and from Casino to Byron Bay. Our matched pairs have been getting up to all sorts of co-created activities including chats, board games, book clubs, movies, day trips, dog walking, community events and even music recitals.
To celebrate all the wonderful friendships, memories and stories that have come out of the scheme so far, the Community Visitors Scheme has produced a book called 30 years of friendship, which you can read and download here. It includes a swag of real, local stories about the friendships that grow between volunteers and recipients when they are matched together. Dip into the book any time to read a short story or two and boost your smile factor to ten.
If you would like to become a volunteer visitor and brighten someone’s day, or you are an older person that would like to receive a volunteer visitor, contact us by calling 02 6621 7397 or emailing kahnquinlan@nrcg.org.au.
