StreetWork Australia is a for-purpose, community organisation working with vulnerable young people affected by: crime, mental health concerns – including suicide and self-harm – violence, destructive relationships, social isolation, homelessness, school/education disengagement, poor employment opportunities and alcohol and substance misuse. For the past 40 years, StreetWork has supported vulnerable young people, to turn their lives around and reach their full potential. In 2019 the *Community Impact Value of StreetWork’s early intervention and prevention programs was $87.6m. The programs achieved a 92% success rate and for $1 invested, a $16 saving was returned to the community. *Source PWC
HOW DOES CHRISTMAS IMPACT VULNERABLE YOUNG PEOPLE? Meet Will, a young person who recently graduated from StreetWork’s flagship, KickStart Mentor Program. Will’s story is a first-person account of how Christmas impacts our vulnerable young people and why an early intervention and prevention program is so critical at this time of year. Watch Will’s video https://bit.ly/3n7Q72O | ||||
THE CHALLENGES FACED BY YOUNG PEOPLE Young people in Australia are struggling, and they are facing challenges in several key areas. 1. Suicide is the leading cause of death for young Australians aged 15-24. 2. 24.3% of young people have a mental health condition, have anxiety and are at greater risk of; suicide, self-harm, substance addiction and a variety of other mental illnesses. 3. 21% of young people who are early school leavers experience life-long financial hardship and poverty including debt, homelessness and housing stress, family tensions and breakdown, boredom, alienation, shame and stigma, increased social isolation, crime, erosion of confidence and self-esteem, the atrophying of work skills and ill-health. 4. 26.5% of young people are without adequate work whether unemployed or underemployed. 5. ‘Adolescent limited’ offenders, that is, those who exhibit antisocial behaviour only during adolescence, make up 75-80% of juvenile offenders and this is often the result of boundary pushing, peer pressure, impulsive and reckless behaviours, poor decision-making and alcohol and drug abuse. 6. 24.9% of all homeless are young people. “The issues impacting young people are everyone’s business and StreetWork is committed to achieving a significant reduction in the number of young people experiencing life-long disadvantage. The breadth and depth of disadvantage experienced by vulnerable young people, and the complex and compounding interactions of these problems, makes StreetWork’s mentoring program – KickStart – unique in the social need that it addresses. Intervening early in a vulnerable young person’s life is viewed favorably by the youth services sector due to the importance of building strong foundations in the early development phases to prevent the cumulative risk factors that are more difficult to address in older life stages” states StreetWork’s CEO Helen Banu. |
