Exciting new developments in 2024.
Smoke-Free Community of Practice
Now into its second year, the Smoke-Free Community of Practice is a great group of people from community service organisations who share knowledge, learnings, and new ideas to prioritise smoke/vape-free conversations and activities.
The Community of Practice provides support, encouragement and resources for:
- Community service organisations wherever they are on the smoke-free journey; and
- Workers to make smoke-free activities part of everyday practice.
Would a project like this one help your organisation go smoke-free? Find out how to get started by joining our next online Smoke-Free Community of Practice meeting. You can register your interest by contacting Bronwyn Tilbury, Community Services Development Team Leader, via email.
Community Smoke-Free Projects
TasCOSS have produced ten fantastic case studies that summarise a broad range of community-led, place-based smoke-free projects. The case studies explain what the project was, successes and learnings, and provide links to more resources.
You can read more about each project by clicking on the name of the organisation below. Case studies are also available as PDF downloads at the foot of this webpage.
| Organisation | Project Theme |
| 1. George Town Neighbourhood House | Create a cosy education hub dedicated to education and counselling sessions about smoking, vaping, and alcohol and other drugs |
| 2. Karinya Young Women’s Service | Repurpose and refresh an outdoor living space that had been a designated smoking area into a shared smoke-free zone |
| 3. Launceston City Mission | Create individualised action plans to support people on their quit journey and promote a community culture of health and wellbeing |
| 4. Northern Suburbs Community Centre | Upskill staff and volunteers in brief intervention conversations about smoking in a sustainable, train the trainer approach |
| 5. OneCare | Support the Umina Park site to become a smoke-free workplace and establish a new smoke-free outdoor area |
| 6. South East Tasmania Aboriginal Corporation | Update their six week Smoking Cessation Education program, which includes free nicotine replacement therapy, resources and mentoring to support people wanting to quit |
| 7. Starting Point Neighbourhood House | Conduct a seven session smoking cessation education program to get people thinking about why they smoke and being open to other choices |
| 8. Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre | Use Smokerlyzers (carbon monoxide monitors) as education tools and to start conversations about smoking |
| 9. Tasmanian Men’s Shed Association | Education activities and smoke-free resources to encourage smoke-free spaces within Men’s Sheds. |
| 10. Wyndarra Centre | Change the front entrance of the community building into a smoke-free space and invite conversations about quit smoking attempts |
| 11. Trust-Based Funding | Trust-based funding addresses power and money imbalances and emphasises building collaborative relationships where both funders and grantees are accountable to each other |
2022/23: Conversations around Smoking Cessation
As part of the Smoke-Free Communities Project, TasCOSS was engaged by the Department of Health to better understand the potential role of Tasmanian community service organisations in supporting smoking cessation, particularly among priority population groups.
Through conversations with community service organisations, peak bodies and other stakeholders, a clear understanding of the current enablers and barriers for community service organisations in supporting smoking cessation was achieved. The most commonly heard themes were:
Barriers
- A perception that talking about smoking is not a priority.
- Lack of staff education and training.
- Need for improved health literacy of community service organisations and clients.
- Smoking is an addiction and it is hard to quit.
- Some community service organisations have a ‘smoking culture’.
- It is difficult to access health care professionals and nicotine replacement therapy.
- High cost of nicotine replacement therapy.
Enablers
- Ongoing trust between staff and people who use services.
- Quick and easy access to free, combination nicotine replacement therapy.
- Incentivising quit programs.
- Quit smoking support workers.
- Peer-to-peer learning.
- Providing education about smoking and quit smoking resource.
These themes were also reflected in the findings of the project’s literature review, survey results, extensive consultations via interviews and focus groups. It is clear from the many conversations we had that the potential future roles of community service organisations will focus on long-term culture change to normalise smoke-free lives. Specifically, multi-faceted support programs for clients that include education about smoking cessation, increasing health literacy, improving access to health care workers and nicotine replacement therapy, and increasing the number of smoking cessation support workers.
Building on the foundational work during this first phase of the project, TasCOSS will work with community service organisations in a second phase: a project plan for TasCOSS supporting smoke-free community services is in development to support embedding smoking cessation into the everyday practice of community service organisations.