Youth

On Tuesday 18 June, we hosted the 2024 Wingecarribee Youth Forum, bringing together young minds from across the region to shape our community's future. Held at the Council's Theatrette, the forum was facilitated by The ASE Group, an organisation led by young professionals dedicated to empowering youth through workshops and summits.

Participants engaged in various workshops designed to enhance their leadership skills and foster creative thinking. These sessions covered:

• Networking Skills
• Identifying Leadership Qualities
• Pitch Writing and Public Speaking
• Ideation and Innovation

Following the workshops, students had the opportunity to present their ideas to a panel of local leaders, including Patrick Nellestein from River Road Academy, Leila Varga from ASE Group, Kate Munro from Youth Action, and Kathryn Baget-Juleff, Council's Manager Community Life and Libraries. Students presented innovative ideas for local events and initiatives aimed at creating a youth friendly shire and ways to enhance youth engagement.

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Council adopted the Wingecarribee Youth Strategy and Action Plan 2016-2026 on 14 December 2016 following an extensive period of community engagement that included community surveys and forums. The plan aims to support young people in our Shire and encourages and promotes the improvement of services and opportunities for young people.

To ensure our strategies and plans remain current and continue to meet community needs and expectations, Council is currently developing a new Youth Action Plan for the Wingecarribee Shire, informed by the lived experiences and feedback of our Shire’s young people.

Young people have been encouraged to identify key areas of concern, brainstorm solutions to these issues, design their ultimate youth program, and share their vision for our Shire’s future. We are using this valuable information to develop a new Youth Action Plan which will set out a strategic direction for the delivery of youth programs, activities and events into the future.

The new Youth Action Plan will go to Council in the first half of 2025.

Wingecarribee Shire Council received a Youth Opportunities grant from the Department of Communities and Justice (DCJ) to run a full year’s program of creative multimedia arts events led by young people, for young people, in 2022 and the first half of 2023.

This ‘FUN ‘Da’ MENTAL’ project aimed to build the vocational and artistic skills of our local youth while developing their leadership capacity and sense of belonging.

A Youth Committee was established to guide the project’s direction and to organise a diverse range of workshops and exhibitions. 5 young people came on board as part of this Committee, and met fortnightly at Creative Space in Bowral to plan activities and create art.

Over the course of the project, many workshops were run, and opportunities were offered to young artists to exhibit their work in the Civic Centre Atrium Gallery and at Creative Space in Bowral.

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Create & Celebrate was a project funded by Department of Communities and Justice in 2019.

The original goal of the project was to bring together a group of young people to develop and host a series of youth events, activities and workshops.

Shortly after the group was established the Covid-19 pandemic took hold around the globe, but the group of young people involved in Create and Celebrate were not to be stopped and continued to meet goals by developing their program in an online format and hosting range of events.

After the break in Covid restrictions, the group developed and participated in a range of in-person workshops that focused on skill development in the music industry, as well as skills to assist with employment. They were also able to host the Fools Festival that saw over 700 young people from different high schools in the local area connect to celebrate their skills in a live performance at Moss Vale Showground.