How Save the Children’s RAP turns reconciliation into practical action
Reconciliation Action Plans (RAPs) are a tool to help organisations in Australia turn commitment into consistent action. Save the Children Australia’s Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (January 2025–January 2027) sets out how we will align our structures and influence to support the national reconciliation movement which is grounded in humility, learning, and accountability. It also reflects our belief that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children should be able to fully exercise their rights and shape their own destinies.
What are Reconciliation Action Plans?
A RAP is a structured plan that helps an organisation put reconciliation into practice across its culture, operations, and relationships, and to support the national reconciliation movement.
Karen Mundine, Chief Executive Officer of Reconciliation Australia, describes an Innovate RAP as “a crucial and rewarding period” that helps build foundations and relationships for “sustainable, thoughtful, and impactful RAP outcomes into the future.”
Why RAPs matter
Reconciliation requires ongoing work, including the willingness to examine what has and hasn’t been done well. In our RAP, Save the Children Australia acknowledges that our last RAP expired four years ago and that we did not make the space nor resources available to update it. In response, we undertook an honest assessment of progress and formed a First Nations Advisory Committee to help drive the creation of the 2025–2027 plan.
This matters because reconciliation is not separate from how an organisation operates day to day. A RAP creates a clear framework for action, and it also creates accountability (internally and externally) for what is delivered over time.
Our vision for reconciliation at Save the Children Australia
Save the Children Australia’s RAP vision begins with truth-telling and responsibility: acknowledging the truths of the past, while working towards a tomorrow where all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples can fully exercise their rights and shape their own destinies.
The RAP also states that Save the Children Australia carries the profound responsibility to examine our organisational history and current practices to ensure we foster a culturally safe environment, for staff and for First Australians we work with. It explicitly commits to “action, not just words,” and to standing in solidarity with Aboriginal leaders, communities and community-controlled organisations in their fight for justice, reconciliation and self-determination.
The core goals of our Save the Children RAP
To embed action for reconciliation across our organisation and work, the 2025–2027 RAP is framed within the three pillars of Relationships, Respect and Opportunities, and founded on strong Governance, monitoring and reporting.
Relationships
Developing and maintaining relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, communities and organisations founded in two-way learning and equality through stronger partnerships, appropriate representation, and celebrating and promoting reconciliation internally and among partners.
What “Relationships” looks like in practice
Relationships impact how decisions are made, who is heard, and how we act when asked to stand alongside First Nations leadership. One deliverable in the RAP is the development of a public statement of commitment describing how, when requested, Save the Children will support the advocacy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander–led organisations for government policies that fulfil the rights of First Nations children and communities.
The RAP also includes a truth-telling initiative: a process to examine how Save the Children Australia’s current and historical policies and practices have impacted First Nations people, communities, families, children, partners and employees, so potential harms can be identified, acknowledged and appropriately addressed.
Respect
Instilling deep and unfaltering respect for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples throughout our programs and organisation through ongoing cultural learning, and meaningful observation of cultural protocols and days of significance across our organisation.
What “Respect” looks like in practice
Respect includes cultural learning, cultural protocols, and the way we show up publicly and internally. The RAP commits to continuing to embed and communicate a First Nations Engagement Principles resource, including the purpose and significance of protocols such as Acknowledgement of Country and Welcome to Country.
It also includes clear commitments around significant dates and organisational participation, including:
● Communicating our approach to January 26
● Acknowledging NAIDOC Week
● Recognising National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children’s Day and the International Day for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
● Encouraging participation by executive and Reconciliation Action Committee members in external NAIDOC Week events.
Respect is also reinforced through internal policy and culture work, including reviewing and communicating anti-discrimination policy and developing strategies to raise awareness of reconciliation across the workforce (in consultation with the First Nations Advisory Committee).
Opportunities
Growing representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across our organisation, especially increasing the number of First Nations staff in management and leadership roles, and broadening commercial relationships with First Nations suppliers.
Governance, monitoring and reporting: Strengthening accountability by engaging both the Reconciliation Action Committee and the First Nations Advisory Committee to guide implementation, and reporting RAP achievements and challenges internally and externally.
What “Opportunities” looks like in practice
Opportunities in a RAP are about shifting representation and influence, not only through employment, but through the way an organisation spends money and builds relationships.
In our RAP, we commit to practical employment actions, including:
● Ensuring job advertisements state that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are encouraged to apply
● Advertising job vacancies through approved pathways to reach Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander stakeholders (including Indigenous Employment Australia).
The RAP also includes procurement commitments, including improving representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander suppliers in key supplier categories.
How we monitor progress
Our RAP sets out a governance structure designed to ensure clear lines of communication and accountability. It includes formal roles for the Save the Children Board and Executive Team, and operational oversight through the Reconciliation Action Committee and First Nations Advisory Committee. The RAP also commits to regular engagement with Reconciliation Australia processes, including maintaining up-to-date contact details and accessing Reconciliation Australia’s RAP Impact Survey.
How the RAP connects to our work with children in Australia
Save the Children’s work in Australia is delivered by 54 reasons, named for the 54 articles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The RAP’s focus on reconciliation aligns directly with our child rights approach: working alongside children, families, communities and governments so that children’s rights are real, respected and part of everyday life.
The RAP describes 54 reasons’ rights-based services for more than 25,000 children, families and caregivers every year, including early years care, violence prevention and recovery, youth justice support, education engagement, family support services, and professional development to strengthen the sector’s capacity to deliver child-centred, rights-based supports.
Strength Through Culture
The RAP artwork, Strength Through Culture, was created by Elizabeth Yanyi Close, a Panaka Skin Anangu woman from the Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara Language Groups, with family links to Pukutja and Amata in the APY Lands. The artwork illustrates growth rings from trees forming a topographic representation of connection to Country. It includes painted dots representing children walking alongside 54 reasons and reflects the relationships and interconnectedness of land and people.
Reconciliation Action Plans help organisations move from intention to sustained action through relationships, respect, opportunities and accountability. Save the Children Australia’s RAP is one part of how we aim to walk that path with integrity: learning from the past, strengthening cultural safety, backing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leadership, and supporting First Nations children’s rights through the way we work, every day.