Category: Uncategorised
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🌿 From Data to Dialogue to Concert: How Lithgow’s Young People Reimagined Their Town
When we talk about regional youth development, it’s easy to get stuck on the familiar list of challenges – boredom, long distances, substance use, limited activities, employment scarcity, family pressures, and service gaps. It’s a story many regional towns know by heart. But what if the real opportunity lies not in what’s wrong, but in…
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Lean In or Hold Back: The Unconscious Group Dynamics Behind Authentic Engagement
and Why It Matters for Strength-Based Practice In my last reflection, Here We Are: When Relationships Became the Practice, I named a realisation that’s been brewing for years – one that many practitioners, leaders and changemakers across our ecosystem are waking up to…The real work isn’t the method.It’s the relational conditions that make the method…
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🌟 Youth Workers: The Ones Who Refuse to Grow Old
Youth workers are a special kind. They walk beside young people in some of the most tender, messy, and transformative chapters of their lives – helping them see their own potential when the world can’t always see it for them.They hold hope like a lantern in difficult spaces. They remind us that care, creativity, and…
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🌱 The Problem With Empowerment – And What To Do Instead
Why “giving people power” often backfires, and what agency-centred practice offers instead The word empowerment is everywhere.We talk about empowering young people, empowering communities, empowering staff, empowering “the vulnerable.” Empower everyone. But if we look closely, empowerment often carries an unintended message:that we hold all the power,and they have none until we decide to hand…
Soulgen 