I’m writing this late Friday night surrounded by the chaos of semi packed travel bags and last minute visits from friends as I get ready to fly off to the UK tomorrow. As I mentioned in my last blog I’m off to present Big Buddy to a national conference in the UK and talked to lots of mentoring organisations over there. Our work in Wellington continues, still have not found our man down there but we are finally getting some very interesting applications for the Wellington coordinator position we have been advertising for 5 weeks. I spent some time down there last week meeting with the CEO of Barnardos, Murray Edridge. Murray is very keen to support the expansion of Big Buddy, was quite inspired hearing how we work and what values drive us. I spent time with Jenny from Barnardo
Monthly Archive for March, 2007
4 weeks and counting until we start running the first ever Youth Quest Programme in Kapiti. Getting all a bit scarey now we are so close.
Had to organise with the Army for the first and second week to book the camp for the Breaking Down Barriers Bush and Military Camp. All go there the date is set we head off to the bush 02 April.
Time now to start putting our feelers out to find the first lot of youth for Youth Quest. Out of the blue got a call from a desperate mum ready to give her 16 year old son the boot from home. She had been given our Youth Quest brochure from Birthright in Kapiti and wanted to know if we could help her son. We met with this mum and yes this young man was a prime candidate for Youth Quest: angry, disobedient, no respect for his mother, mixing with the wrong crowd, drugs, and in trouble with the police. To cut a long story short he is our first client for Youth Quest. Because there was still 4 weeks to go until the programme started we put him into some work experience with a local builder to keep him busy and keep him out of trouble. To our amazement he loved this work experience and ended up working 3 weeks with this building team full time. What a great start one young man directed towards the right track, and choosing himself to make these changes in his attidude.
Through liasing closely with the local Kapiti Police Youth Aid team we started to be given young lads details that Police were having continued trouble with. Now the hardest part, convincing these young guys to sign up for Youth Quest. We had no problem getting the parents to agree but battles every step of the way convincing these young guys that they can’t continue on the path they are heading.
Recieved a letter to confirm Lotteries were giving us $10,000 to allow us to run the first Youth Quest Programme in April, yahhh this will help heaps now Tan and I won’t have to put so much of our savings into the programme.
Also my Youth Mentor Terry and myself became volunteers to help out at the Kapiti Pak n Save Charity Golf Tournment on the 15 March. We were both assigned to the toilet hole where contestants were made to tee off from a toilet seat down the fairway. The longest drive was over 150 metres.
Pak n Save are giving us funding to allow us to purchase a luggage trailer from this fundraiser.
What a full on day this was as we were at the golf until 5.30pm rushed home, showered and changed and then Tan and I were off to give a presentation about Youth Quest to Kapiti Rotary. This evening went really well with Kapiti Rotary offering to fund raise for Youth Quest in June 2007. What a great outcome for Tan and I, more local support.
Spent the rest of March getting youth confirmed for the programme.
Had 6 places available but due to time restraints and limited funding we have confirmed 4 young guys for the first course all charming young lads very well known to the local Police, the Police are telling us we have the cream of the crop. Should be an interesting 12 weeks….
29 March 2007 – We opened up Youth Quest with an official Launch where we invited all our potential funders, Police, Department of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Youth Development, Child Youth and Family, Work and Income, Kapiti Coast District Council, other youth service providers in the area to come and have a small party with us to celebrate the start of Youth Quest. Tan and I were amazed at the turn out for this event with over 40 people from different agencies and organisations turning up to support Tan and I with Youth Quest in Kapiti. We were overwhelmed by all the support and were just glad that we had made enough yummy food to feed an army…..What a great morning we had with all these people, getting their imput and feedback about Youth Quest.
Well only 4 days to go until we head out into the bush for the start of the programme we are so excited!!!!!…
Well the month of Feb has been even busier than Jan.
With my two Youth Mentors now on board with me full time we spent most of the last 3 weeks preparing Power Point Presentations for the lessons that we will be teaching the young people on Manage Stress, Manage Anger, and Drug and Addiction Management. This has been a very time consuming task but the lesson plans are now complete and ready to go.
The Youth Quest Team which now consists of 5 people were invited to attend a seminar that Trevor Grice (bestselling author of The Great Brain Robbery) was taking at the Police College for the Police Recruits on how drugs affect the brain. This seminar was fantastic and after speaking with Trevor Grice he has allowed Youth Quest to use the material in his book to teach the young people about the affects of the use of drugs and wants to support us in what ever way he can.
My Youth Mentor Terry was invited by Project K to take part in their 3 day mentoring course to learn more about his role as a Youth Mentor. Terry really enjoyed this course and when he finished was offered a mentoring position working with young people on Project K. Of course there is no way I would let Project K have him as he will have his own young people on Youth Quest to look after and mentor.
So far we have been unable to gain support from Child Youth and Family Services in Kapiti. Well the head of Police in Kapiti who fully supports us rang us to say he had arranged a meeting at the Police Station with Tanya and I and the Manager of CYFS in Kapiti. After Tanya and I shared with her what we were going to do with Youth Quest she got really excited and said that her and her team in Kapiti would fully support Youth Quest and to our surprise said “how do we (CYFS) make referrals to Youth Quest, as we have youth that would really benefit from the programme??” Both Tan and I were wrapped after this meeting and she even encouraged Tan to get hold of the CYFS Funding Advisor to start the process going for Youth Quest to become a recognised provider for CYFS…Wow how exciting!!!!
Towards the end of last year Tanya and I were asked to attend a meeting with the Regional Manager and his team from Ministry of Youth Development . The four of them drove through from Wellington City to Kapiti to meet with us as they saw the write up in the Dominion Post and wanted to know more about us and what we wanted to do with Youth Quest. Well during this meeting they told us all about the MYD funding and how we would be able to apply. So this month we thought well lets start this process rockin and rollin, so we did. Well little did we know that you cant just apply for this funding its called the Youth Development Partnership Funding and the condition is that the local council has to apply on your behalf and you work with the council to put the application in. Ok so this wasn’t going to be as easy as we first thought and there was two and a half weeks until the closing date. Well the Manager of Work and Income in Paraparaumu has always supported Youth Quest so we made contact with him to find out who we need to make contact with at the Kapiti Coast District Council to talk to about this funding. To our surprise he organised a meeting for Tanya and I with the right people in the council and it was up to us to sell Youth Quest to the council and convience them to apply for this funding for Youth Quest, and prove to them the the deadline of two and a half weeks was no problem for Tan and I to complete this 20 odd page application. Well the council thought we were mad to try and make this deadline but liked what we wanted to do with Youth Quest and agreed to help us to apply. Well to cut a long story short 6 meetings with the council later (in 17 days) late nights, many emails, almost tearing our hair out and feeling the pressure Tan and I hand delivered the application into Wellington to Ministry of Youth Development two hours before closing. Now its just a waiting game but they have told us no news is good news. This funding will make sure that our two Youth Mentors get a full time wage for the next 3 years…we will find out at the end of April if we have been successfull!!!! Crossing all fingers and toes!!!!!
As you can see there is not enough hours in the day to organise and set everything up needed for Youth Quest, but we have now gained some crucial agency and community organisation support to run this program in Kapiti. Well March will be our final month to prepare for the first ever Youth Quest Programme to run!!!!
I have been involved in a lot of capacity-building work at EDEN this month, including agency supervision, governance meetings, a partnerships and collaboration workshop for NGOs, recruiting a new administrator (the fabulous Louise), funding applications, and plenty of networking. Although this work doesn’t sound as exciting as EDEN’s projects and service provision, it is so important. Ensuring the agency has the capacity, including procedures, policies and resources, to grow, means that EDEN can continue its health promotion work and services for individuals with eating issues.
Alongside this I was also involved in supporting Deb our youth worker to prepare for the Body Image Leader training day onsite at EDEN. During the day the students were introduced to EDEN’s philosophies and model of working with promoting body satisfaction and preventing disordered eating in schools. They learned about the dangers of dieting, the value of healthy body image/body diversity, some critical media literacy skills, and the importance of environments that support body satisfaction. They also discussed their role and the possibilities for activities in their schools throughout the year. Alongside the important messages and learnings for the day, the students also had a lot of fun and enjoyed meeting their contemporaries from other schools.
It was great to congratulate the 2005 World of Difference recipients at the function held by Vodafone NZ Foundation in early March. It was humbling to hear about all their achievements and I enjoyed catching up with several of the recipients including Vicki from SANDS who is in the photo with me below.
EDEN attended an important meeting at the Ministry of Health in Wellington to discuss the Framework for Eating Disorder Services in NZ and funding for services nationwide. The meeting was attended by health professionals providing clinical and tertiary services for disordered eating and DHB representatives. EDEN was the only community agency invited to attend. Jane and I were hopeful that our invitation indicated that the necessity for community, self-help and early intervention services was going to be acknowledged within the discussions, the final framework and the funding decisions for the sector. However, most of the day was focussed upon the provision of hospital beds around the country and centred very much on services for those who are acutely ill with an eating disorder. We continued to make the point throughout the day that a comprehensive framework of services should also include early intervention, prevention, education services and support initiatives for those who do not meet a clinical diagnosis for an eating disorder but who still require timely support and information. Most of EDEN’s clients are individuals or friends and family members who want to be proactive about dealing with an eating or body image difficulty. While developing tertiary and clinical services for those who are seriously ill with an eating disorder is clearly warranted, EDEN believes that to only fund services at this level does not acknowledge the important role that early intervention services play. EDEN believes that supporting people when they have identified a problem is a sensible, proactive and compassionate way to work with eating and body image difficulties. The next stage for EDEN in this consultation process with the Ministry is to provide feedback on the meeting discussion and evidence for the importance of early intervention services in this field. Our aim is to assist those responsible for the final framework in recognising the value of early intervention so that community services (such as EDEN) will be sustained by public funding via DHB contracts.
On 1 March Every Child Counts hosted a huge event on parliament grounds. 1000 children from all over the Wellington region came together with Members of Parliament, parents, teachers, grandparents and community groups in a huge Celebration of Children.
The entertainment included music and dancing, fairies, clowns, stilt walkers, face painting, meeting SPCA animals, a display by the fire service, a bouncy castle, making clocks to remind people to give children time, writing messages for Members of Parliament, playing with bubbles … and all sorts of other fun.
We had two great MCs for the day: Suzy Cato from children’s television, and Meyer Peteli a youth leader from Porirua. We also had some great sponsorship support from The Body Shop, The Families Commission, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner, and many others. One of the highlights for the children was receiving crunchy apples from Merven – the mascot for Mission On – the anti-obesity initiative.
A panel of MPs was brave enough to line up to be questioned by children and young people and following their performance they were presented with Every Child Counts clocks to remind them of the need to factor children into everything they do.
The event made television news on both channels that night, and featured in print media around the country too. We received good feedback from MPs too, who welcomed the energy and inspiration the event brought to parliament and the way it brought children’s issues to the fore.
Following the event there was a huge amount of paperwork to do – along with the thank you letters there were bills to pay!
As the month went on and political debate about section 59 of the Crimes Act heated up I was called on to assist the campaign to amend section 59. Currently, section 59 provides a defence that has allowed some parents to be acquitted even though they have seriously assaulted their children.
One of the Every Child Counts is to reduce child abuse so I am pleased to be working on a measure with potential to significantly change attitudes about children and how we parent them.
There is a large body of evidence illustrating that the majority of child abuse cases come about in the context of parents punishing the child1 and that physical punishment has been shown to contribute to a range of negative outcomes. It seems bizarre that so many people would publicly celebrate the fact that they hit their children, and that anybody would want to keep a law that is so obviously in conflict with the evidence.
So, on 28 March I brought together a group of high profile New Zealanders prepared to publicly state their support for law change and call for New Zealand children to be better protected in the law and in every encounter we have with them. They celebrities came together in the Auckland City Council Chambers and put their hand prints and signatures onto a banner called “Hands up for Change.” The banner was presented to MPs the same day.
In addition to this work, I have completed the preparation of the Every Child Counts case for funding support and have lodged some more funding applications
And there’s plenty more to be done!
Its mid April now and things are starting to move and build momentum,the hard thing is to keep up with such big tasks ahead.
One of the major tasks was organising the NZ HIPHOP Nationals April 13th,14th.This competition was a major success in bringing the Hiphop community in NZ together for the very first time. Networking with some well respected choreographers in the industry who have the same focus in creating pathways for youth to be inspired and giving them something to aim for, creating Street Dance NZ. This is the only competition which now qualfies you to compete in the World HipHop Champs in Los Angeles July 07.Dziah Dance Crew has been one of the pioneers in making this happen ,which has taken 2years to finally establish .Dziah placing 2nd in the World Champs 06 has inspired dancers all of NZ. Showing that anything is possible if you put your mind to it. There will be now 9 teams(junior varsity and adults) representing at the World champs. For more info check website www.nzhiphopchamps.co.nz
Was a guest speaker at the Maxim Institute Conference which was held at the Town Hall. Massive opportunity to share my vision to various Government and community groups within Auckland dealing with youth issues and alternative education groups. Stressing that we need to help each other to create a future for the next generation. We have so many individual groups doing the same thing and are functional , but if we all join together and align ourselves with the same vision we will be a lot stronger.We all want a better future for our children and to give them hope where there was none. Also which was a great opportunity to express thanks to the Vodafone NZ Foundation and what an awesome job they are doing with creating people with funds to do their passion fulltime.
Our Dance Studio programs are progressing and are building numbers.we are looking for more quality kids who are wanting to help themselves and are having better commitment from local youth.They love dance and enjoy hanging at the studio after school.The jams are open to anyone held in the afternoons and evenings. Next move is to get in to the local schools again to promote dance jams and promote our new Krump programs in schools.Using Krump in a program is way of diverting positive energy into a dance form..which kids love and creates a fun way for everyone to get involved.Tommy the clown the founder of Krump came to NZ to do a showcase and a few of our Kids got to meet and greet the creator of Krump..which was an experience for them. To end the term, Dziah Choreographers have been doing well and getting a lot of positive feedback from various holiday programs that they have been contracted to teach dance. So far another busy month ahead.