Pasifika Thrive
Pasifika Thrive is a unique strengths-based ecological approach to improving holistic outcomes for Pasifika young people through improved school engagement and improved holistic wellbeing outcomes. Pasifika Thrive provided direct support to at-risk young people in education and community settings and, through the evidence-informed Sports to Success program, built and strengthened the capacity and resiliency of key community members.
Pasifika Thrive boasts a strong collective collaboration of partners as experts in each of their fields: Charis Mentoring Inc, Kokoro Consulting, the Neurosequential Network and Indigenography and Design; mirroring the collective strength of Pasifika cultures.
Our Approach
Charis Mentoring’s current support model came out of the recommendation of ‘Tupulaga Pasifika: A Profile of Pasifika Young People in Brimbank’. Pasifika Thrive mirrors this support model by providing 1) place-based mentoring and outreach programs within the community and 2) capacity building opportunity for our community members.
Mentoring Young People
Supports for young people consisted of 3 place-based programs:
Tautai Lead – Our 1 year in-school Mentoring program that strengthens young peoples cultural identity, builds resiliency, character and leadership skills.
Tautai Excel – A weekly after-school drop-in homework club that provided young people the space to complete homework as well as opportunities to express themselves through the arts and sporting activities.
Tautai All Out – A Holiday Program that brings together the community of young people we work with together with their family and friends as well as the wider community.
Together these programs provided spaces of positive social connection and meaningful engagement for our young people. These programs were delivered across three schools; Victoria University Secondary College, Copperfield College and Melton Secondary College.
A snapshot of our programs:
Community Capacity Building
Sports to Success
The purpose of the ‘Sports to Success’ project was to build the capacity of coaches and sporting organisations in a healing centered and neurodevelopmental approach to coaching and mentoring Pasifika young people.
The program consisted of Pasifika Cultural Competency and six-weeks of 1x hour sessions of ‘Intro NM-Sport Training’ delivered by Dr Bruce Perry from the Neurosequential Network and a ‘Power of Sport to Heal – Practical applications of NM-Sport’ workshop delivered by We Coach and Kokoro Sport.
Evaluation
As we implement supports and solutions for our Pasifika Communities, the importance of evaluating our impact helps to evidence our practice and remain relevant to our context. Indigenography and Design provided an external evaluation of the Pasifika Thrive Project.