The Art of Dialogue: Group Facilitation Skills for Working in a DFV Program - Brisbane (December 2026)

This training seeks to provide hands on facilitation skills training for those working in the specialist DFV sector, particularly those working in perpetrator intervention and victim advocate roles, with an opportunity to participate in interactive training and enhance their group facilitation and one-on-one facilitation skills with perpetrators and/or victim survivors.  

Participants will learn skills necessary to address accountability, collusion and co-facilitation while centring a survivor's lived experience, particularly in an MBC program.  This training connects our work to the four pillars that keep widespread domestic and family violence in place and deepen each facilitator’s understanding of Paulo Freire’s approach to dialogue and facilitation.  

This program references a pedagogical approach by Paulo Freire and focuses programming on being survivor-centered and including the voices of survivors. 

Learning Outcomes

This training will cover:  

• The principles of dialogue;   

• What makes an effective facilitator;  

• How to connect with social, cultural and individual experiences of power, families and violence;  

• How to respectfully expose contradictions in thinking;  

• Paulo Freire’s stages of consciousness; and  

• Alternative possibilities for beliefs based in equality and partnership.  

Event Details

Session 1: Monday, 7th December 2026
Session 2: Tuesday, 8th December 2026
Session 3: Wednesday, 9th December 2026
Session 4: Thursday, 10th December 2026

Time: 9:00am - 4:00pm AEST (All sessions)

Location: Karstens Brisbane - Level 24/215 Adelaide Street, Brisbane City QLD 4000

Please note: This is a 4 part series. Participants are required to attend all four dates.

Travel support is available* – click here to apply. If you are unable to download the application form please email workforce@healingfoundation.org.au to receive a copy. *Target Group Services Only

Who should attend

Practitioners or men's behavour change facilitators, who want to develop dialogue and facilitation skills. This training meets the requirements for 25-hour group perpetrator intervention training of at least 25 hours duration.  

This workshop is relevant for anyone who works in the Domestic and Family Violence sector that: 

• makes partner contact calls of perpetrators in MBCs;  

• facilitates support groups with victim survivors  

• facilitates groups with women who use force in intimate partner relationships; and/or 

• wants to improve overall facilitation skills, including training facilitation in the DFV sector. 

About the facilitators

Melissa (Petrangelo) Scaia, MPA  

•   Co-founder of Global Alliance for Women’s Safety and Equality    

•   Domestic Violence Trainer and Consultant for UN Women and Domestic Abuse Project in Minneapolis, MN  

•   Co-founder and author of Domestic Violence Turning Points  

•   Former Director of International Training at Global Rights for Women  

Former executive director of Domestic Abuse Intervention Programs (DAIP) also known as “the Duluth Model”. Prior to working in Duluth she was the executive director of Advocates for Family Peace (AFFP) for 17 years, a local domestic violence advocacy program. She has also trained internationally on Integrated Responses and has led and organized three Coordinated Community Responses (CCR) to address domestic violence in Minnesota.  She also has trained internationally on perpetrator programmes while also co-facilitating groups for men who batter and women who use violence for over 25 years.  
  

Rosemary O’Malley  

Rosemary O'Malley was the CEO of the Domestic Violence Prevention Centre (DVPC) from 2016 to February 2023. She commenced working for DVPC in 209 and was the Manager of the Men’s Domestic Violence Education and Intervention Program (MDVEIP) for seven years. Previously she worked for many years at Queensland Corrective Services (QCS) where she commenced facilitating the MDVEIP in 2005. Her academic background is in criminology, and she has written journal articles and contributed a chapter to the book Domestic Violence, Working with Men: Research, Practice Experiences and Integrated Responses. Rosemary sat on the Domestic Violence Death review Advisory Board and was the Convenor of the Queensland Domestic Violence Services Network from 2020-2022. She has travelled to the United States to investigate good practice regarding men's programs, fathering programs and integrated responses and she delivers workshops and speaks at conferences throughout Australia on the importance of collaborative practice between government and non-government organisations to improve the safety and well-being for those experiencing and escaping violence.  

Rosemary now works in a consultative capacity in the DFV Sector and delivers workshops and training, as well as Professional Supervision across all levels of the workforce.