Profile on Meredith Oglethorpe - Grandparent Advisor, Melbourne's Eastern suburbs.
Victoria Media Release
Thursday, 9 December 2010
Faced with caring for a young family when her husband passed away, and experiencing a kinship relationship with her niece and nephew, Meredith Oglethorpe understands the value of having a good support network.
That’s why with her own personal experience, plus the many years she’s spent working in various specialist roles within Centrelink, Meredith was the ideal candidate for one of the newly created Grandparent Advisor positions.
Based at Oakleigh and servicing Melbourne’s South East, Meredith said she was pleased to accept her new role, providing a single point of support and assistance to grandparent carers and allowing them to better access information about payments and support services.
"With my own personal experience and my work background I have an understanding of the support and payments grandparents require – I’ve specialised in Family and Child Care," Meredith said.
"It’s a huge part of what interested me in this role, as well as maintaining my knowledge to assess customer entitlements and researching to ensure their entitlements are correct."
Meredith hasn’t wasted any time in helping grandparents in her area.
"I’ve visited several local community and support groups and from that I’ve received lots of enquiries and referrals through our 1800 number, which is great," she said.
"In connecting with these groups, I’ve also discovered many grandparent carers are apprehensive when it comes to dealing with Centrelink or coming into a Centrelink office.
"As a Grandparent Advisor it’s been great to be able to visit these groups to provide an outreach service. It’s really helped me to break down those barriers and stereotypes and provide a friendly, human face to Centrelink to ensure all grandparent carers, whether they’re customers or not, are linked in with us and receiving their correct entitlements."
Meredith said her presence has also been welcomed by other local, state and federal government organisations that have a related interest in assisting and supporting grandparent carers.
"I found many organisations have been so happy and somewhat relieved to know they can now call me directly to gain a better understanding of some of the Centrelink payments that grandparent carers are entitled to, because they always get asked so many questions," Meredith said.
"This means we can both provide grandparent carers with better information and support."
And as for her role so far Meredith says she couldn’t be happier.
"I am really enjoying my role as a Grandparent Advisor,” she said.
"I think it’s mainly because of my own personal experience, and because I feel there’s a real need for it as family demographics are changing.
"This role has really opened my eyes to how many grandparent carers we really do have out there, and I love the fact I can help to educate and empower them with specialised knowledge."
People wishing to contact Meredith can call 1800 245 965 toll free.
For more information, telephone the relevant Centrelink Media Contact.