Meet your Australians - 2025 QLD Senior Australian of the Year Dr Bronwyn Herbert. ACM is proud to be media partner for the 2025 Australian of the Year Awards.
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NewsTranscript
00:00I've worked as a social worker until I was 81 years old.
00:06I've worked with a lot of people who are experiencing domestic violence
00:11and we worked through those issues.
00:13And then I also worked with people in homelessness
00:17and I became a manager of a homeless program
00:20for families with children.
00:22And as time went by,
00:25I noticed that some of the children were returning
00:28and I wondered what we could have done differently
00:31to prevent this intergenerational homelessness.
00:34I decided that I wanted to do my Master's
00:37to achieve better outcome with the things that I was doing
00:41and so I worked on that
00:44and I decided I'd do my PhD when I was in my 80s.
00:50For my PhD, I worked on homeless families as voices
00:56telling me how they felt about their homeless experiences
01:00because there's not much written about that
01:03and I want to hear how they felt about the parenting they received,
01:07the education, the schooling they had and their employment
01:12and later their relationships and the housing they now currently have.
01:17So that's the area I worked on,
01:19looking at what the children felt about their homeless experiences.
01:24I would like to see a wraparound service
01:27with children and their whole families
01:31because they all need support when they're homeless.
01:35This would involve supporting parents with their parenting role,
01:41helping them to discipline safely
01:44and would look after the children, support them to go to school
01:50and to get a better education.
01:53I loved working with people
01:55and I loved helping them to become stable in their housing.
02:00My aim in life is to help people make a positive change in their lives
02:07that they could experience happiness and enjoy living daily.