Reconnecting young people with their careers
The (DET) Reconnect program is funded by the Victorian Department of Education and supports vulnerable young people over the age of 17, families, and people with an asylum seeker background who live in Wyndham and Melton.
Through this program, the Centre for Multicultural Youth (CMY) primarily supports young people who have been disengaged from employment and education for at least six months. Dal and Lauren* are two young people who have been engaged in the Reconnect program. We sat down with them to hear about their experiences and journeys as they reconnected with their careers.
Dal is a South Sudanese man who has been engaging with Reconnect for the past 12 months. He was referred to the program by a social worker of his and at first, Dal was skeptical.
“I didn’t even think it would help as much, ‘cause I’ve been to other programs,” Dal says.
Despite his reluctance at first, Dal was very vocal about the help provided by CMY’s Reconnect Multicultural Youth Worker, Julie Babiano.
“They have helped me with a lot of stuff. Any issues going on day to day, they’ll sort it out,” says Dal.
“[Julie’s] done for me everything … my motto for her is, like, she gets s*** done.”
Dal voiced his frustration that most jobs expect everyone to have access to a car or a driver’s license. Luckily, Julie and the Reconnect program were able to assist him with cab charges to travel “if you have a long way to go” for job interviews or other appointments.
“Another company would just tell you on the job or the course: ‘you’ll find your own way there.’ Reconnect will actually try and sort something out,” Dal says.
“I had an interview one day at the airport and I didn’t know how I was going to get there, so [Julie] helped me out with that.”
On top of this, Reconnect is supporting Dal to get his forklift license and also covered fees for education. Dal was also assisted, with additional help from youth worker Kathleen from YouthNow, with obtaining work in a warehouse and eventually picking up a role at Streat Cafe.
“I’m 20 years old now, I’ll admit that your brain is just jumping everywhere to everywhere like: ‘You wanna do that. Do this job. Do that.’ Like, so many careers I want to do,” says Dal.
“Now, I’ve just gotta try everything you know, times like these times, it’s pretty hard getting a job without that experience. You gotta take the experience you get.”
Lauren is a young woman who has landed her dream job due to the help of the Reconnect program. She was part of a Seat at the Table, a program that places young multicultural women on Board observerships, and also completed an internship with YouthNow.
She stumbled across CMY and Reconnect through engaging in another program and a mentor of hers suggested that she give the program a go. After joining the program, Lauren was assisted to obtain the important things she needed for her career.
Like Dal, Lauren faced several barriers to gaining regular employment. The main one being the financial expectations placed on expectant new workers. Fees to cover the many compulsory hurdles were too much for Lauren. Reconnect removed most of these barriers from Lauren’s path, allowing her to enter the workforce.
“They helped me create my resume, they helped me apply for my police check, my working with children’s check, my first aid certificate and also helped me obtain my license,” says Lauren.
“As soon as I got my license, life became easier.”
Before joining with Reconnect, Lauren was “really down,” and was unsure what she wanted to do with her career. Lauren cites Julie’s “profound effect” on her as something that gave her more direction.
“When I first started with the Reconnect program, I was a bit confused on what I wanted to do with my life,” Lauren says.
“I knew I was doing community services, but seeing Julie, I wanted to become a youth worker, and now I’m a youth worker, just like her.”
Even though Lauren has finished with the Reconnect program, she still keeps in touch with Julie when she can.
“I still talk to Julie about it, when something exciting happens,” Lauren says.
“I’ve gone in for interviews, she’s like, ‘good luck,’ and I tell her when I’ve got it. And now we talk once in a while.”
*Lauren’s name has been changed.