RM 0ll Certificate in Cultural Safety, Real Change Working Respectfully with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples
- Description
- Curriculum
- Reviews
Cultural Safety, Real Change:Â Â Working Respectfully with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.
Build the practical cultural safety skills needed to work respectfully, confidently and effectively in community services, counselling and health settings.
Cultural safety is more than awareness It is about how people experience your service, your communication, your workplace and your professional practice. This unit supports learners to recognise, respond to and actively promote cultural safety for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples, clients, colleagues, families and communities. Developed in consultation with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders, this Learner Guide moves beyond box-ticking training. It invites learners to reflect on their own cultural lens, understand the impact of history and power, and build respectful communication practices that can be applied directly in the workplace. Across four structured sections, learners explore the historical, social and political factors that continue to shape service access, trust and engagement today – including colonisation, the Stolen Generations, loss of land and culture, racism, discrimination, kinship, community connection and self-determination. |
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Turn YOUR learning into workplace action
You will develop the skills to identify cultural safety issues in their own workplace:
- model culturally safe practice
- develop strategies that support genuine partnership
- evaluate whether those strategies are creating real change for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people and communities.
You will be provided with practical guided activities, workplace examples and reflective tasks. We ensure we connect theory with everyday practice. This unit connects theoretical learning with practical workplace application.
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What you will learn
- How cultural factors influence service delivery, trust and client engagement
- The historical, social and political context affecting Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples’ experiences of services
- How to recognise your own cultural bias and reflect on professional practice
- Communication approaches that show respect for cultural difference
- Ways to build genuine partnerships with Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people and communities
- Strategies that support self-determination, participation and community control
- How to evaluate and improve cultural safety strategies over time
As a core unit of the Diploma of E-Counselling and Telephone
Counselling, this unit supports learners to become practitioners who can work
with greater respect, awareness and accountability alongside Aboriginal and/or
Torres Strait Islander peoples.
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1
Section 1 Part 1: Identify cultural safety issues in the workplaceHow can workers recognise when a workplace is not culturally safe for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples?
This lesson helps learners identify cultural safety issues that may affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clients, workers, families and communities. It explores how workplace systems, communication, assumptions, policies and everyday behaviours can create barriers to trust, access and respectful service delivery. Learners will consider how cultural safety is experienced by the person receiving the service, including whether they feel respected, able to access care and safe to raise concerns
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2Section 1 Part 1: Identify Cultural Safety IssuesAll questions must be answered.
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3Section 1 Part 2: Identify cultural safety issues in the workplace
Cultural safety issues in the workplace can appear through communication, behaviour, policies, service processes, physical environments and leadership decisions. They may include rushed or unclear communication, assumptions and stereotypes, limited community involvement, tokenistic cultural inclusion, lack of trust, racism or bias, and poor support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff.
Identifying these issues requires workers and organisations to look honestly at how people experience the service. This includes reviewing workplace practices, listening to community feedback, checking access and outcomes, observing communication styles, reviewing policies and reflecting on power and decision-making.
Workplace examples may include intake processes that feel rushed or intrusive, family involvement being limited, Aboriginal staff being expected to carry cultural responsibilities without support, or feedback being collected but not acted on. Cultural safety improves when workplaces listen, respond, adapt and create services where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples feel respected, heard and safe to engage.
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4Section 1 Part 2: Identify Cultural Safety IssuesAll questions must be answered
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5Section 2 Part 1: Model cultural safety in own work
Awareness of Own Cultural Bias
How can your own values, beliefs and assumptions influence the way you work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples?
This lesson helps learners recognise how personal culture, workplace habits and unconscious bias can affect communication, decision-making and service delivery. Learners explore why cultural safety starts with self-awareness, reflection and a willingness to adapt practice. This links directly to the unit requirement to ensure work practices are grounded in awareness of one’s own cultural bias
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6Section 2 Part 2: Model cultural safety in own work
Respectful Communication and Cultural Brokerage
How can workers communicate in ways that show respect for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, cultures and communities?
This lesson supports learners to use respectful communication techniques and work practices that recognise cultural differences. It also explores when to engage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander interpreters, colleagues or cultural brokers to support clearer understanding, trust and culturally safe service delivery. The unit specifically requires learners to use respectful communication techniques and engage cultural brokers according to situation needs.
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7Section 3: Develop Strategies for Improved Cultural Safety
This lesson helps learners develop strategies that improve cultural safety in workplace practice and service delivery. Learners explore how to build respectful partnerships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, identify useful resources, reduce barriers to participation, and support self-determination and community control in services and programs. This aligns with CHCDIV002 requirements to support partnerships, use resources, document culturally safe service strategies and encourage self-determination.
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8Section 4: Evaluate Cultural Safety Strategies
How do you know whether cultural safety strategies are creating real change?
This lesson helps learners evaluate cultural safety strategies by setting clear outcomes, involving Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in evaluation, reviewing programs against agreed goals and revising strategies based on feedback. Cultural safety evaluation should be shared, respectful and accountable – not something decided by the service alone. The unit requires learners to agree outcomes, involve Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people, evaluate programs and revise strategies through appropriate engagement.
