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The Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC) – the national regulator for charities – recently launched an online learning program called ‘Governing Charities’. This program consists of eight online courses which support leadership and accountability in the charitable sector and importantly, are provided free of charge – you can access the courses here.
 
Clifford Gouldson often advises the charitable sector and in our experience, many of those working in the sector find it difficult to justify spending their funding or fundraising dollars on training for their team. Accordingly, we wanted to share the availability of some free training from the government regulator – of course, we cannot endorse its contents, but wanted to ensure our valued clients, referrers and contacts were aware of its availability.
 
The courses are available online and each course takes between 1-2 hours to complete. The courses cover a range of topics including:

  1. becoming a charity board member and the obligations and responsibilities of a charity board;
  2. an overview of the ACNC’s role, activities and their responsibilities;
  3. the processes involved with establishing a new charity; ;
  4. importance of good governance, relations between governing body and stakeholders and internal policies and procedures;
  5. the six core governance standards of charities, which is broken into two separate courses;
  6. guidance on how your charity can meet External Conduct Standards which govern a registered charities operations outside of Australia; and
  7. charities’ reporting obligations and how to read and interpret key financial documents.

The courses are designed for those on the board or committee of a charity or in another leadership role and are intended to boost their skills and expertise, to effectively perform their role.

Advisors to charities may wish to pass this information on to their clients and contacts.

Further information, templates and other resources are also available on the ACNC website here or if you have a specific question, you can contact our Commercial and Property Team.

This article was written by Michelle Broome, Lawyer. For further information please contact Amanda Tolson, Director.