Our Futures – youth project
Our Futures is a collective impact, community led project that is about increasing the visibility of young people, building their capacity and skills, whilst increasing their opportunities to engage in meaningful decision-making across the George Town Municipality. Our Futures is funded through the 2021 Strategic Initiatives Grant from the Tasmanian Community Fund, with additional funding contributed by George Town Council. Jeder Institute has been engaged as project evaluators. You can access their reports here.
The 5 phases of the Our Futures project:
Foundations.
Engaging young people, building relationships, co-designing approaches.
Capacity Building.
Delivering workshops and building the skills of young people to be effective leaders.
Raising Youth Voices.
Collecting data, sense-making and sharing with the wider community.
Driving Change.
Young people leading the solutions and sharing decision-making power with the wider community.
Learning.
Evaluate, reflect and refine to be the leaders that the rest of the state look to for inspiration.
The Our Futures Project is supported by the Tasmanian Community Fund and works in partnership with the George Town Council. You can visit Council’s Youth Policy at https://georgetown.tas.gov.au/policies/. For further information, please contact andrew.beeston@georgetown.tas.gov.au
Videos
The 2024 George Town Youth Week featured the YMCA Skate Park League, live music and a wide array of creative fun and vibes at Regent Square. The Youth Impact Council also filmed the event and had roving reporters asking youth what they love about Our Futures , as well as what they’d love to see in the future.
This Seagulls to Chips video is of the July 11 2023 training day that highlighted presenters from Futures Isle, Think Media and Smash Attacks. Young people learnt a range of team building and event management skills as well as developing creative content.
On Wednesday the 3rd May, as part of National Youth Week, the Future Impact Group held a variety of free events to engage and celebrate young people. The celebration included the launch of the George Town Youth Impact Council which is part of the broader Our Futures program.
Seagulls to Chips
Co-designed by young people, the Seagulls to Chips Youth Leaders Program has been created to be an effective avenue of capacity building and change-making for young leaders aged 12-16 each year in the George Town area.
The program hosts a range of high-end facilitators that delivers relevant training to selected young people with an opportunity for the youth to create and participate in youth events in and around George Town.
The program is also adapted for Student Leadership days for schools in George Town.
Youth Impact Council
The George Town Youth Impact Council is made up of individuals aged 12-24 that live or attend school in the George Town municipality and that have a heart to help shape a positive future for all young people in the community.
They are passionate about representing young people about issues, concerns and opportunities that can be generated at a local government level, whilst having a finger on the pulse of state and national influences.
The team meet on Wednesday afternoons with a mix of formal and informal meetings scheduled throughout the year.
Art Street Art
Art Street Art is a youth project funded by the Premier’s Fund for Children and Young People in collaboration with the Youth Impact Council and George Town Council.
Art Street Art has the opportunity to turn Macquarie St (the shopping precinct of George Town) into Art Street, by creating Street Art.
A fun play on words 😉
The project will be co-designed by local youth (term 1), with workshops to equip them in skills (term 2&3) and installation of various forms of street art to launch an Art Street event (term 4).
Art Street Art works to encourage youth to develop a sense of pride in the precinct and to contribute creatively to the streetscape of the town, minimising vandalism, anti-social behaviours and damage to Council and public property.
Youth Voice Collection
Our aim is to collect 250 voices each year that will help shape a positive future of George Town youth. Survey results and reports are presented to the Youth Impact Council who launch the survey results with the Future Impact Group and George Town Council each year, with the latest happening on the 6th Dec 2023.
Future recommendations have been made based of the Youth Voice Collection, and also serve as an informative resource for community and wellbeing strategies in the George Town municipality.
By participating in the consultation process, your voice is one of many that will be heard and taken into account as we look to develop better services and strategies for George Town youth.
Youth Outreach and Engagement
Andy Beeston, the Project Coordinator, aims to be at the heartbeat of the community, establishing and building relationships with the wider community.
As a way of keeping on track with youth needs and opportunities, the Our Futures Champions meet regularly to ensure that the Our Futures project is on track.
The Champions key purpose is to provide advice, support and accountability to the delivery of the “Our Futures” Youth project jointly funded by the Tasmanian Community Fund and George Town Council.
Jeder Institute has been engaged as Project Evaluators and assist with the monitoring, evaluation and learning development of the Our Futures Project.
Photos
