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Peter has been a volunteer at St Hilarion Aged Care for 10 years. Peter has been responsible for the creation of the Adami Organic Garden and Keelan’s Fruit Grove. He was able to network with local business and schools to create a fruit garden consisting of 32 trees and an organic vegetable farm. As a result of Peter’s hard work, residents are actively involved in the upkeep and development of the garden and the produce is utilised in the daily meals. We take great pleasure in commending Peter for his dedication and loyalty he gives to the Italian community.

CO.AS.IT. (SA) is pleased to announce their new ‘Ciao’ Application (App) for iPad and iPhone which has recently been developed by CO.AS.IT. (SA) Inc. for the aged care and health care sectors. It is specifically designed and tailored to educate and support staff and volunteers to communicate more effectively with Italian speaking clients in an aged care setting. It can also be used by anyone wanting to learn some basic Italian words and phrases and has even been utilised in schools. The language words are split into many categories for ease of searching for a word or phrase. Workers can create their own shortlist of favourites relating directly to their role e.g. medical staff, carers etc. All the categories have visual prompts, text and voice recordings. Some examples of the categories included are greetings, feelings, family, religion, instructions and health care. ‘Ciao’ is an instant resource that supports workers and volunteers quickly when communicating with Italian speaking people. It allows workers and volunteers to communicate more effectively, giving older people a real feeling of appreciation and acknowledgement. The App also has direct links to Italian agencies so anyone can call, email or source information online instantly in relation to Italian cultural information or services available. These links include CO.AS.IT (SA), ANFE, CIC, PISA, Bene Aged Care and St Hilarion Aged Care. The App is highly innovative and the first of its kind. We hope other community groups will be able to use this model to develop similar Apps to support different groups in the community. It is free of charge to download. Our main goal is for as many people to benefit from this application as possible and for older people to benefit from a culturally responsive service. The application concept and trials were developed in collaboration with Domiciliary Care, The Department for Communities and Social Inclusion and has received wide support from both Italian and mainstream agencies, hospitals and schools. We are very happy with the positive response so far from providers and older people and we hope to provide further updates and cultural information to continually meet their needs. We also hope to develop an android version in the near future. The Official Launch of ‘Ciao’ took place on 17th April 2015. For more information please contact Luisa Greco, Project Manager at CO.AS.IT. (SA) on (08) 8346 9393 or Luisa@coasitsa.org.au