SAILING TO SUCCESS PROGRAM
Introduction Developmental youth work is about participation, building connection, competence, character and confidence. The CCC sailing program is a developmental youth work program that focuses on youth who are disadvantaged or at risk of being marginalised.
It aims to extend personal boundaries and experiences in order to help these young people develop important life skills and build their self-esteem, and at the same time break down the barriers that often exist between these young people, adults and mainstream society. This innovative program is a joint initiative of Wesley Newcastle Youth Service and Lake Macquarie Sailing Charters.
Confidence building and giving the participating young people life skills is a fundamental aim of the program. Over the five days of the program we will see the young people grow with confidence, make new friends, take up leadership roles and work together as teams. This is the first time such a project has been initiated in this manner in Newcastle and it is about business and communities working together for our youth.
The fundamental idea is that the discipline of sailing is a useful way to develop teamwork, leadership, and social and communication skills, which are so often important in dealing with life issues, such as decision making, conflict resolution and working with others. The skills the young people learn here will be something they can use for the rest of their life. They will learn that sailing is a lot like life. If they don¹t work together as a team, then they¹re not going to get anywhere.
Program goals include promoting social and cognitive competencies, increasing confidence, self-esteem, and self-efficacy, encouraging connections to other people and communities, developing character through increasing self-control and morality, and fostering caring and compassion.
The program¹s environment will encourage the development of supportive relationships with others, empower youth, communicate expectations for positive behaviour, and enable opportunities for recognition.
Program activities include opportunities for skill development, engaging in real and challenging activities, broadening horizons, and increasing available supports. Skills including problem-solving, decision-making, planning and goal-setting have been identified as indicators of cognitive competency and therefore contribute to the objectives of youth development (Roth & Brooks-Gunn, 2003).
These same skills have been identified as individual protective factors that contribute to positive adaptation associated with resilience. Finally, the program seeks to develop opportunities to enable young people to develop positive relationships with partners and corporate sponsors such as Lake Macquarie Sailing Charters, the Newcastle Jets and Companion Credit Union. Young people are encouraged to work with staff and partners in relation to sponsorship which can contribute to the development of positive relationships with other adults and organisations and provide them access to professional skills and resources.
Partners and sponsors will establish positive interaction with young people that will foster hope and life changing behaviors. In particular, Lake Macquarie Sailing Charters sailing instructors and Jets players can provide a mentoring and coaching role in the areas that they are skilled i.e. teamwork, cohesion, communication and leadership. Not only is sailing a healthy activity, it is fun. The program will be available to young people between the ages of 16 and 22 years who reside in or have strong links with the Newcastle and Lower Hunter area.
The program will give up to 10 young people the opportunity to sail with professional sailors, youth workers, sponsors and volunteers in the Margarita, a 58 foot luxury yacht with a racing pedigree including the Sydney to Hobart Race, Gosford to Lord Howe Race, Hamilton Island Series, Darwin to Ambon, Asia Pacific races and six years cruising the Mediterranean. The pilot program will be conducted over 5 days from Thursday 17th to Wednesday 30th August 2006.
Program structure Participants The program is open to young people who are active clients of Wesley Newcastle Youth Service and Wesley Newcastle City Mission Job Placement & Employment Training (JPET)
Rules All participants, including young people, facilitators and sponsors, must: o contribute to the values and aims of the program o operate within the duty of care guidelines of Wesley Newcastle City Mission o comply with the appropriate activity risk management/supervision guidelines of Wesley Newcastle City Mission
Evaluation The program team is committed to the process of continuous evaluation. Feedback on all aspects of the program is welcome at all times. Please refer to the contact list for ways to contact program staff. Participants will complete a self-rating exercise at the start of the each program in order to establish benchmark information. At intervals throughout the program, follow-up evaluation surveys for participants will allow staff to measure its success.
Launches and closures The service encourages functions celebrating the launch and closure of programs. Guidelines for launches and closures will be included in future programs. A Certificate of Participation will be supplied to all participants at the closure of programs to acknowledge achievements and completion of the program.
Planned approach to personal development aims Programs need a planned approach to the development of the personal skills of participants. By working with young people, specific personal development elements can be identified to enable programs to use these as the starting point for program development. Hence, personal development is not left to chance. The following framework will be used to assist in this process.
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