Video transcript

Onscreen: How the NDIS supports you

Michelle (mother of Ella and Penny): Ella’s plan is comprised of therapies that include occupational therapy, speech therapy, she also has psychologist appointments in there, and social skills classes. A lot of the goals that we’ve got set into our plan is to integrate her into mainstream classes and mainstream activities, and it definitely creates that.

David (father of Ella and Penny): And we’re definitely seeing an improvement in that, which is fantastic for us, really.

Onscreen: Preparing for a NDIS meeting

Michelle: In preparing for an NDIS meeting I usually speak to Ella’s therapist and get an up-to-date review to take into the meeting with me so that they’ve got an idea of what goals she needs to set for the next year.

Lisa (mother of Maddy and Thomas): It’s really comforting knowing, you know, we get to December and we do a new plan, it’s actually quite exciting to sit there and think of your child’s goals for the next year and where you want them to be, and you’ve got someone to talk to about that. You feel more, just complete, it’s great.

David: For me, I think, not just coming with the goals, but ways to achieve them and then reviewing how that’s going. So you can actually sit down and read, in writing, so, OK, this is what we sat down, this is what we talked about, and this is where we’re going on that, and you can actually, basically gauge how you’re progressing, how your child’s progressing and where you still need to concentrate.

Michelle: We’re very happy with our current plan, it is everything that we expected and that we feel is necessary for our daughter at this point.

David: Yeah. I think it’s been a positive year, certainly from where we started. We had some issues late last year and were very worried about this year of school. So, I think so far we’ve been very happy, and the only time we’ve needed a change in our plan, it happened extremely quickly and without fuss. So there’s flexibility there if you have any problems with one particular thing, you can adjust it.

Lisa: The best thing about the NDIS is that comfort as a parent, knowing that that monetary part is taken care of and knowing that the service doesn’t stop. It’s there next year.

Michelle: I think the best thing about NDIS for me is the peace of mind knowing that her plan is ongoing and that it’s not running out any time, and as long as she needs this extra help, she will be able to get it.