Every week on a Wednesday, when Sutherland Shire Children’s Court is operating, Project Youth provides Court Support for young people. This means engaging with young people, linking them to the Children’s Court Solicitor as well as making referrals to our internal programs or other organisations if appropriate. Our very own Youth Support Worker Tegan spends time offering support relevant to the needs of young people and providing guidance in what can be a stressful time. 

When a young person goes into court for an offense, they’re typically making more than one trip. During these trips, Project Youth will ask the young people if they would like someone to talk with and guide them, provide them information about the process and what they can expect, or if they just need someone to sit in with them. Eventually, these young people could feel comfortable enough to engage in support planning and potentially engage in other programs to assist in education, family counseling, and even employment.

As you might have guessed, Covid has had a major effect with the programs that have been able to run and appropriate referrals for young people. While court still carries on, there is a lot of unknown about whether or not programs will be able to start up or resume. There is also the factor of support workers not being able to attend court for a variety of Covid-related reasons. 

We work closely with other organisations. This is key to providing young people with the support they need and sharing the load between those we partner with. These partnerships are invaluable and mean that more young people can access this assistance and the support planning doesn’t fall just on Project Youth. With more organisations being able to help, obviously it’s for the better of the young people.

As we move forward, a goal we have for Court Support is a directory of programs and services from a number of organisations that the courts can choose from to suit young people that come through. This directory would hopefully lead to more positive outcomes and less guesswork for the courts to deal with.

Recently, a young person came to court who had a number of issues at home. They had been getting into trouble with drugs and alcohol which garnered the attention of the law. The young person became disengaged from school, which allowed for too much time on their hands which caused more trouble. When this young person came to court, they were linked to Project Youth. Once of the great things about our programs is that they intertwine and this young person was able to resolve issues they were having. They went through Family Counseling with their family, moved into our accommodation, and they enrolled in some TAFE courses. After some time in the programs, there was some more stability, the family relationships improved, the young person stopped using drugs and alcohol and they gained employment.

That is only one positive story of many that we come across from young people that enter into our programs from Court Support and end up utilising the great programs we have. We highlight many more of these great stories on our socials. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn for more.