Life Skills

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Dennis Bills

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Don't Leave Home Without One!
A Home Leaver's Survival Guide.

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"This book should be gifted by government to every Aussie youngster about to leave school. A quintessential component of every Australian household, school and library."
- The Adelaide Advertiser - Geoff Roach

"This book covers everything from cooking to setting up bank accounts, to even the new IR laws. Mea culpa - I actually boiled sausage rolls rather than putting them in the oven when I first moved out of home!"
- 612 ABC Radio Brisbane - Madonna King

"It's a really useful tool for anyone wanting to leave home - I reckon you've covered pretty well everything."
- 891 ABC Radio Adelaide - Spence Denny

"Dennis Bills, a former teacher and school camp leader, knows a thing or two about mentoring the young." - Notebook Magazine

"I'm going through the book and there's all sorts of great things in here. It's written in our language about our society. This book is going to fill a gap." - 774 ABC Radio Melbourne - Richard Stubbs

"A lot of parents say to me, "I think I'm going to buy this book and give (the kids) a hint to leave home!" Congratulations on the book." - Susie Eleman - 'Susie' WIN-TV

"Leaving home...it's harder than you think. You don't leave anything out, it's a VERY useful book. Congratulations on it." - 936 ABC Radio Hobart - Christopher Lawrence

Dennis Bills' Life Skills and Self Management Programs - 'The Forgotten Curriculum'

For home leavers, school leavers, young employees, employers and Job Service Australia members, job seekers, educators, and young sportsmen and women. .

Are our young adults and school leavers ready for life after school? They may be academically proficient and work skilled, but is that enough? Home life and secondary schools provide both security and predictability, but in the time immediately after, our young people are often left to their own devices. Unfortunately they don't always have the right information, especially when they make critical decisions, sometimes in the heat of the moment. I'm not convinced that our approach to the transition between school and life thereafter is working, or that it ever has. The Australian Bureau of Statistics says that educational attainment is one of the most significant influences in the transitional experiences of school leavers. The question is whether our current interpretation of 'educational attainment' is satisfying the complete needs of our students, or just the needs of those who measure achievement.

With this in mind, I've developed a series of life-skills and self-management programs for young adults. They are based on the fundamentals of self-sufficiency, and focus on the concept of adaptability and sustainable living. My 'BUMPS AND SIGNPOSTS' programs promote a broader perspective of society and perhaps a more holistic outlook on educational outcomes for young adults.

The basic premise is this: The sooner young adults can successfully manage their own lives and can successfully negotiate their way through day to day existence, the sooner they can put more effort into their jobs, their relationships and their communities.

The world changes constantly, and grows in complexity with each new day. So it's vitally important that our young adults understand how it works. They should have access to all the information we can give them. But the sheer volume of information has made it difficult for families to offer a clear perspective on life choices and the right places to source information. Educators too are often restricted by the demands and confines of curriculum, often leaving our young adults with a lack of real life information, or worse still, the wrong information delivered by the wrong people. Education has numerous academic checks and balances, yet there is no measurement of how well we've prepared our young adults for life in the real world.

The transition is also associated with many other changes; like new employment, further study, a new town, city or suburb. We all know that it's a steep learning curve, and we also know that things don't always flow smoothly. It should be one of the most exciting stages of their young lives, yet there are an assortment of circumstances that can leave some of our young adults particularly vulnerable. But with the right preparation and the right information, I believe their chances of success can be increased dramatically.

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Programs are available for:
* Secondary Schools - where everyday senior students are about to cross the great divide between school life and
   further study or employment.
* Universities, Tafe's and Group Training Organizations - where students are about to, or have already
   commenced independent living.
* Businesses and Employers - who want their young employees organized, efficient and switched on in the workplace.
   Higher job satisfaction and an increased work output are more likely if the lives of their young adult employees have structure
   and organization away from their place of work.
* Community and Government Agencies - with universal concerns for the ongoing well-being of our young adult
   population.
* Teachers Professional Development - for schools that want realistic life skills for their senior students, particularly those
   already taking substantial and occasionally misguided steps across the threshold of independence
* Job Service Australia Members and their clients - who may need to introduce and reinforce basic Life Skills and Self Management through realistic, easily understood programs.
* Professional sporting associations - who wish to reinforce basic Life Skills and Self Management skills for young sportsmen and women, particularly those who suddenly find themselves relocated from their home base, and thrust into the world of professional sport with all it's well documented pitfalls.