Warrior Woman Foundation

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Barbara Clarke

Director

Barbara is a highly successful and well regarded secondary high school teacher. She worked for the NSW Department of Education and Training for 32 years, teaching Economics, Legal Studies and Business Studies. Highlights of her career include roles such as Senior Marking Coordinator for the Higher School Certificate, Writer for the High School Certificate Economics exam, as well as 14 years of student welfare support as Year Advisor.

Barbara has a long-standing history of volunteering in multiple community driven organisations outside of the teaching realm including Scouts, Venturers, and mentor roles with girls’ charities.

In 2017, Barbara took on her most challenging role yet as a crisis support telephone operator with Lifeline, a role she still holds today which has given her greater insight into the diverse needs of young vulnerable women.

Barbara’s proudest achievement to date is raising three extremely caring and compassionate sons, who she calls “good men,” who have forged healthy, strong, and balanced relationships with their wives/partners and are doting fathers/uncles.

In 2020, Barbara was appointed Director of the Warrior Woman Foundation. Her extensive experience in delivering education and training programs, and her experience in welfare support and crisis management, brings an incredible skillset to The Warrior Woman Foundation board. Barbara joins a strong network of passionate like-minded women, who are working together to identify and create ways to support and advance the young women of Australia who are our future.

We provide a safe and welcoming space for young women to share, learn, heal and grow. Each young woman is connected with a mentor as well as a network of diverse community-minded women who provide ongoing support and share their life experiences, resources and opportunities:

  • Connection to a safe, stable, and socially inclusive network of female role models to turn to for advice and ongoing support for the duration of the six-month program.
  • Connection to a non-judgmental group of young women who are facing similar challenges.
  • Connection to Kindred Warrior Peers, young women who have experienced challenges in life and have gone on to achieve life success.
  • Weekly one-to-one mentoring sessions with a safe mentor.

We teach young women the life skills they need to succeed in everyday life. Our “teach a young woman to fish” approach gives them support and guidance at every step, knowing that true empowerment comes from them learning to do things for themselves. In particular, we focus on financial literacy and job readiness:

  • Life-skills workshops to build self-reliance.
  • A six-week Financial Literacy program (in partnership with MoneyGirl).
  • A four-week Job Readiness program.
  • Assistance in gaining and retaining meaningful employment.
  • Access to a range of vocational skills scholarships (e.g., Code Like a Girl) and internships.

Many young women experience trauma which negatively impacts their confidence, self-esteem and self-worth. We support and nurture the trauma healing process in safe psycho-educational workshops facilitated by experts. In these sessions, young women learn to engage with self-compassion, and to soften and contain threat-based emotions, such as fear and anxiety, anger, shame and self-criticism.