Our Story
Celebrate Ageing Ltd was established in 2013 by Dr Catherine Barrett, and became a Charity in 2019. Our mission is to build a grass roots movement focused on combating ageism and building respect for older Australians.
Values
- Integrity: ensuring our work communicates the genuine valuing of older people
- Voice: amplifying the voices of older people
- Equality: hearing the voices of marginalised older people and reducing marginalisation
- Co-leadership: creating spaces for older people to co-lead change
- Empowerment: sharing power and supporting change champions
- Creativity: utilising art and narrative based approaches to engage critical mass
- Culture change: creating sustainable culture change.
- Partnership: seeking meaningful partnerships to promote change
- Authenticity: living the valuing of ageing and older people in our work and in our own lives.
Our approach
Our innovative programs bridge the evidence-culture gap through art and narrative based approaches. At the heart of our work is the Elder Leadership Academy, which recognises older people's capacity to co-lead change.
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Evidence-Culture Gap
For over a decade Celebrate Ageing Ltd has been investigating what it takes to bridge the gap between what we know (The Evidence) about ageism and the (Culture) change needed. We know this enormous task requires a critical mass of people. We also know working with Early Adopters or champions is a powerful way to kick start change. We utilise art and narrative based approaches to open the hearts and minds of The Majority and work hard to ensure Marginalised older people are included - and that marginalisation is prevented. These approaches enable us to build a national networks of champions for change - a critical component of sustainable culture change. |
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Empowering older people The Elder Leadership Academy is at the heart of Celebrate Ageing. The Academy offers Fellowships to older people to co-lead projects combatting ageism and building respect for older people. We believe consultation, representation, co-design and co-production all have a place - but older people have the skills to co-lead and should be given every opportunity to do so. The outputs and outcomes achieved by the Fellows demonstrate the wisdom of this approach. We greatly value the opportunity to work in meaningful partnership with older people - particularly from marginalised groups. |
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The work we do
The work of Celebrate Ageing includes programs, partnerships and events. Our programs include the Elder Leadership Academy, the Centre for Intergenerational Power, The Kindness Pandemic, Projecting Beauty, She/Hers, and Celebrate Ageing School. Our programs are our major activities that happen all year round. To help design, produce and lead our programs we have formed partnerships with groups of older people who are marginalised. These partnerships have been critical to Alice's Garage (older LGBTIQ+ people), the Museum of Love (people living with dementia), the Opal Institute (preventing sexual assault of older women) and the Polio Papers (Polio survivors). |
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Awards and achievements
- 2023 Victorian Honour Roll of Women, Trail Blazer (Dr Catherine Barrett)
- 2022 Most Uplifting Facebook Group in the World (The Kindness Pandemic)
- 2022 Probono Australia Impact 25 Award (Dr Catherine Barrett)
- 2020 Globe LGBTIQ Person of the Year (Dr Catherine Barrett)
- 2019 GLOBE Award for Promoting Healthy Communities
- 2019 Australian Association of Gerontology Glenda Powell Travelling Fellow (Dr Catherine Barrett)
- 2018 Australian Human Rights Medal Finalist (Dr Catherine Barrett)
