Over 30 young people took part in the annual 20Voices Youth Symposium organised by the Youth Collective in September.
This year’s symposium covered the theme of Youth Health and Wellbeing.
Workshops delivered by STARTTS, Traxide and Fairfield Liverpool Youth Health Team (FLYHT) developed a greater understanding on topics including sexual health, drug abuse and LGBTIQ. They provided young people with an understanding of youth health services available to them in South West and Western Sydney.
The day concluded with young people taking part in physical health activities provided by several sporting teams:
- Western Sydney Wanderers’ players Ruon Thongyik and John Roberts made an appearance and shared their journeys as refugee kids breaking into professional football in Australia. They provided valuable advice about the nutrition and dietary requirements of a professional athlete.
- Sydney Thunder Cricket provided an introduction to cricket.
- The West Tigers NRL team delivered an interactive rugby game where participants explored different aspects of physical fitness and team building exercises.
The day was a great success. Many young people were able to identify their challenges and needs when accessing range of health services and provided feedback to improve service provision.
20Voices is an annual topic-driven workshop-styled event where multicultural youth are engaged in activities to improve their knowledge of, and access to, services related to a particular topic.
Participating NSW Settlement Partnership members include SSI, Western Sydney MRC, CORE Community Services, Macarthur Diversity Services Initiative, and SydWest.