Boost for JCTS cultural safety training program

The Joint Colleges Training Services (JCTS) team will expand its cultural health education and safety training program following an increase in Federal Government funding.
 
In an announcement during NAIDOC Week, JCTS, the RACGP and the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM) confirmed the extra funding from 2026–30 will allow JCTS to create more cultural and medical educator roles across Australia.
 
It will mean more registrars will learn directly from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander educators, with the aim of providing a culturally safe healthcare workforce by addressing conscious and unconscious bias.
 
In 2026, NAIDOC Week runs from 5–12 July under the theme Fifty Years of Deadly: ‘a tribute to the people who built this movement, the Elders who stood firm, the organisers who made space, the artists who turned resistance into expression, and the communities who keep showing up, year after year’.
 
Phillip Dreise, who works as a Senior Cultural Educator at JCTS, said the increased investment builds on previous long-term work.
 
‘For more than 65,000 years, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have shared knowledge, taught the next generation and cared for community,’ he said.
 
‘The work we’re doing at JCTS today sits within that much longer story.
 
‘This funding means more opportunities for cultural educators to walk alongside registrars, share knowledge and support learning.
 
‘We’re building on work that generations of people have contributed to before us.’
 
Dr Jacinta Power, JCTS Head of Medical Education, said the move has the potential to bring enduring change.
 
‘The registrars we support today will still be managing the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients decades from now,’ she said.
 
‘If we want culturally safe healthcare to be the standard in the future, we need to keep investing in cultural safety education now.
 
‘This expansion helps JCTS do that in practical ways, by supporting educators and creating more opportunities for registrars to learn.’
 
Established in 2022, the JCTS is a joint venture of the RACGP and ACRRM to provide cultural education for GPs as well as GP training support to the Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Service sector.
 
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