Employee Assistance Program

Employee Assistance Program for Educators (EAP)

 

Employee Assistance Program (EAP)

The Employee Assistance Program (EAP) is a voluntary and confidential service, to support employees who have personal concerns that affect their personal wellbeing and / or work performance.

This EAP is specifically designed for educators and teachers. The program is a collaboration between Evolve Wellbeing Psychologists, and Phoenix Support for Educators.  

Investment in an annual EAP will include the following features...

Telehealth psychologist appointments

Your organisation will have access to online counselling sessions. You will be matched with one of our experienced team of psychologists and counsellors.

 Learn more about Evolve Wellbeing Psychologists 
Team wellness pack

Our Wellbeing with the Phoenix Cups pack includes the following hard copy resources:

  • Phoenix Cups: A Cup Filling Story novel for your staff library

  • Cup Filling Cards - A deck of illustrated cards to inspire reflection around the teams needs to use during staff meetings

  • The Workplace Wellbeing workbook and online course for your educational leader

  • Phoenix Cups 101 A5 booklet plus eBook - A brief manual to explain the framework to all educators.

 
Logins to the 28 day wellbeing challenge

An online self-paced program to introduce planning for your wellbeing using the Phoenix Cups framework. This online program includes a 28 day challenge of researched based wellbeing ideas. To be provided to members of your team throughout the year at your discretion.

Learn more about this online course
Educational leader support

Includes a login to the self paced workplace wellbeing online course, with downloadable templates and materials.

Learn more about the online workplace wellbeing course
Coaching and mentoring

Your package will be kicked off with a 1 hour coaching and mentoring session (with the approved provider / nominated supervisor / or educational leader), to discuss current workplace wellbeing needs and create an action plan to ensure utilisation of the program and success.

Learn more about our coaching and mentoring
Mental health policy

Your package includes a customisable Mental Health Policy template for your workplace. 

 

Subscription - per service*

$499 +gst per quarter (1 year commitment) OR $1995 +gst annual paid upfront.


Talk to us about booking EAP for your team today by clicking the 'Get in touch' button

OR if you're ready to jump on in without any further ado, you can sign up here and get started immediately

Get in touch
OR
Sign up HERE


Meet your Facilitators

The program will be delivered by the team of psychologists and counsellors from Evolve Wellbeing, and the team of facilitators and counsellors from Phoenix Support for Educators, led by Miranda Watkins and Sandi Phoenix.

Miranda Watkins  BA Psych (Hons) Assoc MAPS

Evolve Wellbeing

Miranda founded Evolve Wellbeing in 2008, and has successfully grown the business into a reputable multi group practice in QLD. Miranda has developed a strong set of values she upholds through her practice including authenticity, growth, discovery and resilience.

Miranda is trained in a variety of disciplines over her 20 years of practicing as a therapist and Psychologist. Some of these include cognitive and behaviour therapy, schema focused therapy, gestalt therapy, trauma processing approaches, motivational interviewing and behaviour change, and interpersonal therapy.

She is an advocate of working to live well, and making conscious choices to empower oneself to create the best possible life across all of the life stages.

Sandi Phoenix BPyscSc

Phoenix Support for educators and The Phoenix Cups®

Sandi is the founding company director and Principal Facilitator at Phoenix Support for educators and has been working in education for over 23 years.

In 2013, Sandi developed a framework called The Phoenix Cups ®, which that has since revolutionised professional development within the education sector by exploring both how staff can support children’s behaviour, as well as how teams view and manage each other’s behaviour. 

The approach provides a framework of how to understand and respond positively to differences and conflict. The Phoenix Cups adds a new perspective to understanding each other and learning to work and live in harmony together.

In addition to this, Sandi is a renowned key note speaker, coach, mentor, workshop facilitator and educator.

FAQ's

How does it work?

Upon upfront payment of your subscription, you will receive:

  • your resource pack

  • a code to access your online courses

  • a welcome letter from us explaining your entitlements

You will then set your organisation a ‘code word’ and inform both Evolve Wellbeing and your employees of this code word. When an employee wishes to utilise the service, they will simply need to call Evolve Wellbeing to book their appointment and say the code word. This hour will then be deducted from your total. Employees can use up to 2 sessions each before requiring written permission from a manager to utilise more sessions.

What if we need more counselling sessions?

 The organisation can determine who and how many treatment episodes an employee may access within a designated period. For example, 2 sessions per calendar year. Sessions will be invoiced on a pay as you go basis.

Once the quota is reached, the clinician will discuss ongoing referral or needs with the client (employee) such as whether they may be eligible for GP Care plan referrals, or private health rebates should they wish to continue with therapy or counselling support.

What else can you offer?

In-service seminars or healthy workplace seminars can also be arranged depending on the organisation’s needs. These can be discussed and quoted on a needs basis.


Why do educators need this EAP?

Australian early childhood educators and early childhood teachers comprise an enormous workforce with the responsibility of the early childhood education of 296,000 children across 15,902 ECEC services . O ne of educator's primary role is to support the healthy emotional and psychological wellbeing of our youngest citizens. The need to focus first on Educator wellbeing has been highlighted recently as the sector is being described as “in crisis” (Fernbach, 2020; O’Connell, 2021) with educators leaving the workforce in droves (Jackson, 2021) as the stressors of the COVID-19 pandemic have exposed existing cracks in the early childhood education systems and policies (Temple & Emmett, 2013). Furthermore, the absence of research and conceptual clarity around educator wellbeing makes implementing strategies to support their wellbeing complicated (Jones, Hadley, Waniganayake, & Johnstone, 2019).
Several conditions have been attributed to educator stress and burnout, from low pay and poor working conditions, lack of professional recognition, lack of professional autonomy, and poor relationships with other educators (Beltman et al., 2020; Eadie et al., 2021; Irvine, Thorpe, McDonald, Lunn, & Sumsion, 2016). On the other hand, important factors have been identified in the research as moderating the negative effects of these variables on educator wellbeing, two of which being;
1) strong collegial relationships (Beltman et al., 2020; Jones et al., 2019; Logan et al., 2020); and
2) finding flow within their work day (Baumgartner, Carson, Apavaloaie, & Tsouloupas, 2009; Beltman et al., 2020; Jones et al., 2019).

The goal to increase educator wellbeing is a worthy initiative within itself. Additionally, strong educator wellbeing will likely flow onto the children they are working with by way of the social and emotional benefits of an educator who is flourishing with their needs met (Coulombe et al., 2020; Temple & Emmett, 2013); increased program quality (Logan et al., 2020; Temple & Emmett, 2013); and the exciting new exploration of the application of positive psychology interventions to the ECEC classroom.

For these reasons, Phoenix Support for Educators have teamed up with Evolve Wellbeing to support  educators and teachers by providing an educator specific Employee Assistance Program, by combining counselling from psychologists with resources, and positive psychology interventions from the Phoenix Cups 28 day Wellbeing Challenge.