VPRS 18206 Admissions, Family Welfare Division/Family and Adolescent Services Division

Full description

This series is a central summary record documenting the admission of children to the care of the Family Welfare Division/Family Welfare and Adolescent Services Division of the various Social/Community Welfare Department's.

The registers served a dual purpose, of both:

- compliance with legislative obligations in relation to registration of wards of the state, and
- as a statistical count for the purposes of reporting and capitation.

Within one of the volumes is a memorandum from the Director of Family Welfare, dated 2/8/1968 requesting a specific record be kept of all children with known Yugoslavian parents admitted to the care of the Division, and requesting a return at the end of each month.

The first volume has separate sections for boys and girls. Thereafter, the registers use a split page system - boys in the top half, girls in the bottom half, with a double page covering a weekly period. There is a detailed statistical count at the bottom of each page, whereby cumulative totals for each code are carried over to the next week. These totals seemed to reset at the beginning of each financial year, which suggests that the records also served a capitation purpose.

In March 1978, the ward numbering system was re-set to a new sequence beginning at 1000. At the same time, the separation of entries by gender ceased, and the format of the register columns changed somewhat. The Admission and Committal codes were replaced with a written reason for admission, and the statistical information also ceased being recorded.

Inside the front cover of many of the registers is a legend relating to the codes used throughout for:

- Age Range
- Native Place (Victoria, Other States, Ex Australia)
- Causes of Admission (11 in total, such as Found Begging; Wandering Abandoned; or Unfit guardianship)
- Causes of Committal (14 in total, such as Larceny; Assault; or Breach of Probation)
- D or N (Delinquent or Non Delinquent) would be placed in the appropriate number column as per the Admission or Committal codes.

The registers are in typical column format and record the following information:

- Ward Number
- Name of Child
- Date of Birth
- Date of Admission
- Court Location
- Code information (as per the legend detailed above).