A Learning Conversation

Please note: this transcript was autogenerated and may contain errors or incorrect names and information

Make Yourself at Home 18-30s in our Community Centres

Rebecca Cox   0:13

Before we begin, I want to take a moment to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the many lands of where people are joining us from today, from all across South Australia, each with their own deep and continuing connection to country. Here on the Adelaide Plains, I acknowledge the Kaurna people and I pay my respects to all elders past and present. Sovereignty was never ceded, always was, always will be Aboriginal land.

Welcome everybody and thank you so much for joining us today. Forgive me for checking my notes to make sure I don’t forget to cover the many things I need to show you about before we start. My name is Bec and co-hosting with me today is Lauren who will give a little wave. There she is. And we’re all so glad that you have joined us today. Just a few quick housekeeping notes before we jump straight in. We are recording today’s session and we will be sharing the recording after the event for those who couldn’t join us right now. So feel free to share the recording with others afterwards if they couldn’t make it. We are going to be keeping everybody except for the speakers on mute today. But please, if you have a video, if I can ask you to put it on, please, it’s so much nicer for our speakers to speak to real faces than an empty box. So if you have a video, please turn it on.

The format today will be a series of questions to our guests and thanks to those who submitted those in your registration process. And then if time allows, we’ll open up for Q&A at the end. If you have questions through the session, please pop them in the Q&A section of this meeting. So you’ll see the Q&A button across the top. That’s the place to pop your questions in there. not in the chat, pop them in Q&A. And keep an eye on that Q&A box yourself. If you see a question that you would really like to see answered as well, you can upvote it to make sure we get to it. We only have an hour or just under now, and it is an ambitious list of questions that we have. So we’ll be watching the clock really closely. If we don’t get to every question today, we will take it on notice.

and follow up in another way with you all. So then hand over to Lauren.

Lauren Bonnet   2:15

Thanks, Bec. So I thought I’d just frame our conversation a little bit. We’ve called the conversation today Welcome Home because we want to explore how 18 to 30 year olds can have a really genuine role in shaping what community centres are and what they would be into the future too. From a community development An approach this explores the leadership or their leadership in defining and designing for themselves what being at home looks and feels like. Across the sector, we’ve had lots of conversations with centres over the last almost a year and broader friends from across other services about how community-led

practice is unfortunately not always where we land, but maybe it’s funding requirements and capacity that can see us defaulting to designing programs and then inviting people to programs rather than being able to facilitate relationship building and resourcing and being open hours that are suitable for

community together. And maybe it’s the red tape that’s in the way of handing over power. Like there’s lots of challenges, but today is a chance to listen and explore what it looks like to walk alongside 18 to 30 year olds meaningfully. And the rest will be up to us as a sector to pick it apart and explore it collaboratively in different ways.

So before we meet our panelists, there’s a few points to make on who we’re talking about today to help frame the conversation, as I said before. So 18 to 30 year olds broadly fall into what researchers and sociologists call Generation Z, and they’re really the first generation to experience the internet.

being a core and consistent part of childhood with access to it across all domains of life, giving them a more digital based childhood than previous generations. Their adolescence in their formative years, so really crucial years, was also significantly influenced by the common use of the smartphone, which was really introduced in 2010.

and the dominance of social media. For our conversation today, a key part to come to the table with together is a shared understanding and awareness that their childhood, their friendships, their sense of self, and their understanding of community is all shaped in digital spaces alongside the physical world.

And what that truly means for how they connect and belong, we’re only actually really beginning to understand. And the data is telling us some important things. So I read this book recently, which some of you may have, The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt. And he highlights that this generation is experiencing some of the highest rates of

persistent loneliness and mental health challenges we’ve ever seen. And it’s not because they’re a fragile generation, but because the world they’ve grown up in and the world they experience is genuinely different and more complex than previous generations.

because of the digital-based childhood. And the structures that previous generations leaned on for connection actually don’t always fit their lives. We also know that this generation is incredibly creative and innovative in the face of challenge. And they’re very values driven, as you’ll see from the people under 30 on the panel today.

incredibly values driven and deeply hungry for meaning and genuine connection. So how can we welcome them home in our centers? We want to also just quickly acknowledge that 18 to 30 year old is not a single uniform group. There is huge diversity within the generation in back

in circumstances, in culture, in how people gather and what’s meaningful to them. There are countless angles we could have come at this conversation today. And really what you’ll hear is drawn from the conversations we’ve been having across centres in South Australia. The questions that centres are asking, the curiosity. that keeps coming up about where this age group in particular are gathering. And we’ve chosen broad starting points to begin that bigger conversation. So let’s introduce our four wonderful people who have agreed to join us today. Take it away, Bec.

Rebecca Cox   6:39

All right, actually, I’m going to introduce 5, just like a birthday special. I’m going to start off with Clarissa. Clarissa Baker is a passionate environmental volunteer who brings firsthand experience of how young people find their way into community as active participants and what keeps them there.

So welcome aboard, Clarissa.

Lily and Willow are members of Rewind Sound and Studios, a DIY community space and commons in Welland that’s completely member-run and shaped by the demographic that we’re talking about today. So welcome to you both.

Natalie Matulik is the CEO of the Youth Affairs Council of South Australia, or YACSA, the state’s peak body for young people and the people that work with them. Natalie brings deep knowledge of the research, the policy landscape, and what young people across our state are telling us that they need. Welcome aboard, Nat.

And Georgie Rocco is the manager of Creative Industries at Northern Sound System, a youth and music community centre in Adelaide’s N that has become a genuine home for young people through creativity and culture. Welcome, Georgie.

Thanks all so much for being here. We’re going to crack straight into it. Thanks, Lauren, for taking it away.

Lauren Bonnet   7:51

So our first question is designed for honesty. So because if we’re going to talk about how centres can genuinely welcome this generation, we need to start with what this generation actually thinks of community centres. So I’m going to ask each of our panellists, maybe we’ll start with

Willow and Lily. When an 18 to 30 year old hears the words community centre, what comes to mind if you can describe it in a few words or a sentence?

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   8:24

Do you want me to do it? Well, I definitely think that community centre would usually make people think of just the buildings where programs happen like Zumba and bingo and like a pottery class and stuff like that.

stuff like not a place where you want to go to hang out, places where stuff happens sometimes that you can sign up to. It’s kind of what we think normally.

Lauren Bonnet   8:54

Thank you, yep, program heavy, yeah, Clarissa.

Clarissa Baker   9:00

Yeah, I would definitely say the same. I mean, I know some community centres are more sort of like, you can hire a space. So people do hire them for birthday parties or different things that they want to do, or yeah, tend to be sort of quite

structured programming. But it’s where people come together essentially to do something.

Lauren Bonnet   9:27

Yep. Nat, do you want to speak to this?

Natalie Matulick   9:32

Sure, I don’t think I’d add anything else except to say that maybe it’s literally as direct as old people, like it’s a thing for adults and old people. I think the program’s angle was really good, but definitely not like a drop in place or a place where you can go.

to use the space.

Lauren Bonnet   9:52

Yeah, and finally, Georgy.

Georgy Rochow   9:55

Yeah, I would say that the young adults I’ve spoken to, the first thing that pops in their brain is that it’s a place for older people and not necessarily community centres or places for people of their age. And having experience of working alongside a community centre, I can say that I know that that’s not true, but

That’s kind of the first narrative that’s popping into people’s young adult brains. I think is, oh, it’s not a place for me.

Lauren Bonnet   10:22

Yeah, that’s great. Thank you all very much.

Rebecca Cox   10:27

Yeah, this question kind of builds on that. So with that in mind, this session, you know, make yourself at home, you know, really gets to the next question. So that we know that many centres genuinely want to include people in this age group. They open the doors and run the programs and they’re, you know, everybody is welcome.

But there’s a difference being about being open to and being built with. And so I guess we want to understand that a little bit more, a difference between attending a space and helping to shape it, sitting at the table where decisions are made. So the question is, what would it actually take for this generation to feel like a centre and its community?

was genuinely built with them, not just open to them. What does real co-ownership look like in governance and in culture and in how decisions get made? So Lily and Willa, we’re going to start with you.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   11:22

Yeah, do you want to go first? Yes. I feel like with Rewind, we have…

meetings that anyone can attend. So even if you’re not a member, you can turn up to a meeting and have a voting point in whatever. We also try to be very inclusive of new people in the space.

Yeah, I mean, I’m failing you. Uh, I…

Came along to an event, and I’ve been friends with these guys ever since, so it’s been…

It’s been really good. Yeah, our decision-making process is pretty structured and like changes and adapts all the time, but it’s basically participation-based democracy. So if you rock up, if you come, you have the same amount of decision-making power as anyone.

And so that people are able to bring their idea and action it pretty much straight away with a yes default answer rather than a no default answer. So your thing will happen unless someone objects to it based on, has to be based on a bunch of principles. It’s, yeah.

 

Rebecca Cox   12:43

Yeah, that’s really interesting.

Great. Nat, you’re my next person on this panel that I wanted to post that question to. And I should just say, I think Ricky is posting the questions in the Q&A chat area. So if you forget what the question is, please feel free to refer there. Nat.

Natalie Matulick   12:59

Thanks, Meg. Yeah, a few things. One is, I think as adults, even if we’re adults who have worked with young people our whole career, we can often fall into the trap of thinking that because we’ve got lived experience of being a young person, we know what being a young person is like today. And that’s just not the case, unfortunately.

being a young person today is very different from what it was 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago. So definitely to Willow and Lillis point around participation and a democracy around that. So inviting youth participation, youth voice in decision making in your community centre would be really interesting. So to that point of allowing young people to help shape it and lead it. So giving away some of the power and some of the control. So opening up and asking the questions of young people what they would like to see at a community centre, what they would use a community centre for.

Natalie Matulick   14:02

what would an inviting community centre look like and feel like and sound like and smell like, all of those kind of things. And then not just asking the questions, but then making sure it’s authentic so you listen to them and it actually gets implemented. Because the last thing we ever want to do is

ask young people what they think or what they want, and then we go ahead and do what we had in our mind anyway and disregard that. The quickest way that you’ll turn young people away is doing that. And then I would say, and so you can take it a step further. And so we talk about youth voice, youth participation, but co-design.

is really best practice where young people are being actively involved in designing what you’re offering for them. I will add a little caveat here because I know across the sector, lots of youth organisations struggle too in that they often ask young people what they want and then they offer it and then young people don’t come. So

It’s not a one like a try once and if it didn’t work, don’t continue to try. It’s sometimes a try and keep the doors open and eventually they’ll come or switch things a little bit and eventually they will come. And the other thing I would just add is to be prepared or be ready to be a little bit uncomfortable.

young people are different to older people and they like different things, different music. And this is again, with the caveat that all young people are very diverse and very different as well. But, you know, as adults, we can get very stuck into the correct way to be and the correct way to interact. And young people often interact differently and interact more loudly, perhaps, or more

you know, whatever. So just be prepared to be a little bit uncomfortable and having young people in the space might change things a little bit and making a real commitment that that’s okay as well.

Rebecca Cox   15:58

That’s a really good point about genuine listening and being really intentional in how you’re implementing those decisions. Georgy, I can see you nodding. I’ve got a little rogue and ask for you to have input on this question as well. I hope that’s okay, Lauren, going rogue already.

Georgy Rochow   16:14

Yeah, and I love Rogue on a Monday. Yeah, I think something I always try to have in my mind is sometimes it’s about providing the space for the conversations, but then literally getting out of the way. I found the most valuable…

times that I’ve gotten a group of young people in a room. I used to work in community engagement for Headspace and I did quite a bit of like try to find out what it was that they wanted in the community. And honestly, if I just brought snacks, got them in a room and then sat in the corner and took notes, the conversations that these young adults were having were so valuable and I found that when I…

as an adult tried to kind of interject that the flow was lost. So I think a big part of it is listening and stepping back and letting go of that control like Nat was talking about. And it is uncomfortable because often young people coming through are breaking down all of the barriers that have been in place and it’s the best thing in the world. But

It does, you have to sit in that silence a little bit and just let them have the floor.

Lauren Bonnet   17:16

Yeah, a lot of really important words. Like I love the decision making democracy, this concept of just listening and getting out of the way. And I guess to Nat’s point, the difference between like consulting and community development are worlds apart.

An area that I guess comes up a lot for community centres, who are largely community led and run because they’re mostly run through volunteering, is how do we engage young people, especially adults post high school, to volunteer?

in meaningful ways in our centers. And what does that look like for them? So, I’m going to pass over to Clarissa in particular, because this is really your jam. You spend a lot of your time volunteering in community, especially in environmental groups. If volunteering was designed

or redesigned from scratch and built around the way that this generation actually wants to give their time and their skills and their energy, what would it look like, or what could it look like, or what works for you?

Clarissa Baker   18:31

Yeah, so for context, I’ve joined a few different volunteering groups throughout like high school and then uni as well. And the things that have sort of stuck for me being a volunteer is through now the Bob Brown Foundation.

And I didn’t actually really have any intention on being like, yeah, I’m going to start volunteering with them. Like, that’s my aim right now is to volunteer with them. It was, it sort of just happened. And it sort of happened through feeling like comfortable with

attending a meeting. Like, well, I guess it even started earlier than that with just meeting the volunteer coordinator and having a chat with them and then feeling welcomed and invited enough to attend a meeting. And that meeting was very low stakes. No, it was basically no commitment. You just showed up with

some food and I work full time. So like showed up with like a bowl of chips or something. It was that like, you know, and they already had someone who was bringing food. And then it was just listen to what they were talking about. And I sort of went home and said, oh, yeah, that’s cool. You know, I may show up for the next one. I might not.

And then, yeah, ended up being free for the next fortnight. So then showed up at the next fortnight meeting and it sort of just evolved from there. So it definitely was a low commitment. And it was not sort of a, here’s the, here’s your role description of a, well, you know, welcome to Bob Brown Foundation. Here’s a role.

you can participate. It was like literally you could do whatever you felt comfortable doing in that space, from nothing to organizing the next meeting. So as I sort of felt more comfortable going along to meetings, then there were opportunities for people to then start to participate more formally through like

taking the meeting notes, or helping write the next agenda, or even facilitating the next meeting. So I sort of started to build that loyalty and trust with the people that were there, with the volunteer coordinator, and just sort of start to feel more confident with the space and with the people. And then eventually

sort of identified that one of my strengths that I could do was take some notes at the meetings. Like that felt pretty low stakes. I was like, okay, I can just whip out my laptop and take some notes. That sounds easy. And then, yeah, it just keeps evolving from there. And then next thing, you know, your taking the notes and then helping with the agenda. And then a few meetings after that, I help facilitate one of the meetings or co-facilitating with someone else. So it’s really about feeling like almost there’s just no pressure for you to have to do anything at all. But if you would like an opportunity to step up into a role, then you feel supported

That’s what’s really helped me stick around in this.

with Bob Brown Foundation is now feeling as though I actually have a…

a responsibility, you could say almost, because I’ve been trusted enough to take the notes and I’ve been trusted enough to organise the next meeting schedule that now, like, yeah, I feel a sense of responsibility to stay with the group and that I actually meaningfully contribute. And now I can share, like, teach other people.

how to do what I was doing when I first started. So, yeah.

Lauren Bonnet   22:32

Wow, there are so many gems in there that we’ll unpack later through the recording, et cetera, and as a sector to learn from. But one of the things that’s striking me is how, I guess it is reimagining how we currently do things in the volunteering world.

that what’s caused you to become so committed and in a way that’s really values driven and really relationship driven is not having an obligation to be committed at the front with a PD and all of that. It’s A flipping of the script.

I guess. Georgy, what are your thoughts on volunteering in the new age?

Georgy Rochow   23:17

Yeah, well, first, I want to say that I really love the line at the end there, Clarissa, around trust. And I think that’s a big part of it is if you give somebody your trust, that empowers them to want to show up and empowers them to want to be responsible and to have a sense of autonomy as well and not being

I guess like mothered all the time and it’s like you are an adult and you can do this. So I think something we are trying to do a lot out at Northern Sound System is building that trust in our young adults and also acknowledging that we’re in a really hard time. It’s, you know, cost of living crisis. A lot of our young people out here don’t have

money, they don’t have necessarily, they’re not engaging in school or they’re not engaging in work. And so we’re trying to find creative ways to have volunteer opportunities that are fun but also have transferable skills that can go into work. And what we’re finding is more and more…

that young adults have two or three or maybe even four different jobs that they’re juggling and this sort of like idea of a portfolio career. And I think the career industries is a really great place to get volunteer experience because you can come and learn how to be front of line at an event or we’ve got tech intern opportunities and

learning hands-on skills in areas that are really exciting and cool as well, and not just, you know, flipping sausages on a BBQ. So that’s important as well. We need the sausages for our punters. But I think what we’re trying to do with volunteering at NSS is really engage a younger cohort because the city of Playford has…

a massive amount of volunteers, but it is an ageing population of volunteers that they have, and they’re finding there’s going to be a big gap if we can’t empower the young people to come through and take up some of those opportunities. But when you look at opportunities that are on the table that are very dry and they are like PD driven, like Clarissa was talking about,

It’s hard to imagine yourself wanting to engage in that. So I think also volunteering in groups can be really helpful rather than one person having to go in on their own. You can say, look, we’ve got three spots available for you and your friends can come in and do this event. And then there’s a barrier that’s taken away, which might be socially awkward.

I don’t want to show up on my own. But I think it’s, yeah, volunteering is really important. If there’s something that is actionable, like a skill that can go on your CV and it’s time that you’re investing, that, yeah, you might be having fun, but you’re also working towards something. Otherwise, a lot of our young people might be better off getting a job.

And trying to make some money, because they don’t have any in this cost of living crisis, so we’re trying to juggle that a bit.

Lauren Bonnet   26:09

Yeah, and what strikes me about what both you’ve said and Clarissa have said is that how do you find what is meaningful? What is a meaningful opportunity? What is a meaningful skill they want to build? What is a meaningful way? How do we know who can take notes in a meeting if we don’t spend the time actually just getting to know?

the people that are coming through our doors or the people that are in our community that are of this age group. And maybe that’s a starting point for a lot of centres. Bette, do you want to take it away?

Rebecca Cox   26:43

Yeah, that’s a beautiful segue to the next question. Before I launch into the next question, just a reminder for those who are joining us today, if you have questions or comments or anything you’d like to say, please pop it in the Q&A so that everyone can see it and we can answer those questions at the end because there’s lots of good content coming out. If you want me taking notes all over the place.

So as now, I’ve lost the beautiful segue. Sorry, everybody. This question is about inclusion and meaningful inclusion more so. So this is about the young people who want to connect and contribute, but for whatever reason, it might be genuinely hard. And that might be about feelings of anxiety or past experiences or exclusion.

financial barriers like we’ve spoken about now, not seeing themselves reflected in a place. And I think that that was you that was talking about how it looks and feels and even smells, or really maybe not even knowing where to start. So we’re not talking about a special program or a targeted initiative. We’re talking about the culture of practice in that place. So what does a community centre actually look like?

when it makes genuine room for this group? What does it feel like to walk in? What has to be true about the space and the people and the approach? And for someone in that position to feel like they genuinely belong. So Lily and Will, I’m going to start with you for that question.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   28:02

Yep.

So we do a lot of work with Rewind and with other community spaces that we’re involved in, like Tabby Gallery, to make sure that we do account for all the different groups, so maybe people with sensory needs. So then we have a task group.

for accessibility, who’s like, we need this room to be, you know, low sensory like input so people can have somewhere to go. Or we’ll have a group that’s about including First Nations people and making sure that we have, you know, free First Nations on door tickets and then

A recent one we didn’t think about was Free for First Nations on the stall holder fee for the markets and just like, just kind of keeping track of making it accessible for everyone. And, you know, with people with anxiety or past experiences and things, we’ve had people come in and go, what is your policy on

blank. And then we have to be like, so true, our policy is this, don’t even worry about it. We always have to go, oh, we actually have a policy. What do you think is a good policy for that? And then we, you know, so it’s very non-hierarchical that you don’t come here and have to immediately fit the rules. You, if you don’t like the rules or you think that we’re wrong,

It’s completely open for making the changes needed so that you can be here. Yeah, and I think that’s what helped me get involved was just that it’s like wrapping my head around the idea that it’s absolutely non-hierarchical. There is no one above you. You walk in the first time, there’s no rule above you. It is the, it’s

Yeah, just everyone kind of trying to make the space fit the values that we agree upon.

Yeah.

Rebecca Cox   29:52

Yeah, that’s a beautiful approach to make sure that you feel like everybody’s feeling included in your space, but also really tricky, I imagine, because it means that you’re trying to meet so many different perspectives and preferences at the same time. So I can imagine that being, you know, a constant thing that you’re thinking about.

about inclusion. Nat, I’m going to throw to you for part 2 on that. Have you got other thoughts to add to that question?

Natalie Matulick   30:18

Yeah, I do, and I agree to 100% with what Will and Lily shared there. I, a couple of things. One is,

I think it’s thinking through what inclusion, what genuine and meaningful inclusion looks like in practice. So if you have a young person who walks through the door for the first time, that’s probably taken a lot of courage for them or pushed them out of their comfort zone to do that. So how we respond when they walk through the door is really important.

And it’s important to find the line between…

not overwhelming them, like being so excited that there’s a young person walked through the door. So you immediately go up to them, back to Clarissa’s point about kind of giving them a program sign up sheet and giving them all this information. Like don’t overwhelm them, but equally just be responsive to them. You know, say hello, maybe start a conversation or have a quick chat or show them

what they can do or where there’s some food is always a good one, make a cup of tea or, you know, whatever it is so that they feel like they are welcome there and they’re in the right place. So straight away, you’ve kind of established that they fit as opposed to they’re a bit of an odd fixture in the space. So I think that’s really important, thinking about what actions we take.

when young people are coming in. And again, it’s that, you know, kind of echoing again what Clarissa and Georgy said, it’s about getting to know the young people. So, you know, not again, not bombarding them with chat straight away, but slowly over time, having chats, having authentic conversation, sharing of yourself, sharing with

you know, for them to share with you so that they can form connection, you know, like real life connection with somebody. And then you can find out what they need or what they don’t need or what they like, what they don’t like and things like that. And then the other thing I think is important is thinking around how you actively include young people in the space and if they’re from different backgrounds.

But equally, any young people in terms of, I think of it like a bridge, like actively going out and finding a bridge to young people, not expecting that, well, we’re opening up our doors and we’re here and we’re saying that we’re welcoming to young people. So we’ll just wait for them to come.

young people might not just come spontaneously. So what is the bridge? What is the reach out point? How do young people find out about you? And how do you maybe form that connection elsewhere so that then when they come, they feel safe or they feel comfortable, they feel like they fit. And so I don’t know exactly what that is, depending on where you are.

where you’re located, what’s around you, but thinking about, yeah, what are those other communities that young people are already in, those different diverse communities, and how can you kind of go and bridge that gap so that they do feel comfortable when they come.

Rebecca Cox   33:12

Yeah, that’s a great example. And sorry, Lauren, I’m going to jump in again and go rogue again because Georgie says she likes it on a Monday. Georgie, that looked like it was resonating for you. Have you thought about it in that way, about extending a bridge to young people coming along to Northern Sound System? And can you give us an example of something that you might have done?

Georgy Rochow   33:30

Yeah, I think what I was resonating with with the bridge concept, I have a very visual mind, so I appreciate that. But I know we’re talking about 18 to 30 year olds primarily here, but I think a really important stage where you can extend that bridge is in high school, like the final years of high school, because…

school leavers, you know, they’ve got all this community around them and all this structure in the last couple years of school. And I know I can’t speak for how young people feel now because I am older. But when I left school, it was suddenly all this structure was gone and my community was kind of gone and displaced.

being a neurodivergent person as well, that really threw me for a second of, well, now I have to go out and actively find a new community. And I think a lot of young people can kind of get lost in that gap. And if you can go and extend the bridge while they’re still in school and they’re still surrounded by community to say, hey, we’re over here.

we exist, we’re nice people, and then they know that there’s somewhere to come back to afterwards. So we go and do a lot of workshops in schools to take music to young people, and that’s a really good way to get them to come in like through our doors. And I think if, yeah, if young adults are still feeling

like they’ve got someone who’s kind of holding their hand a bit and that might be a teacher or a parent. If you can extend an invitation then, then they might feel more comfortable to reach out on their own afterwards. Yeah.

Lauren Bonnet   35:02

Yeah.

Rebecca Cox   35:02

Yeah, thanks. That’s an awesome example.

Lauren Bonnet   35:05

I’m going to outrogue you back and skip between questions. So watch us freak out later. But we’re talking about the bridge. This is like one of the main questions we get from centres or the centres want us to pose is around engagement. Like if we’re starting from scratch, how do we find people? So the question is, and I guess

Clarissa, Lily and Willow, we really need your advice and your wisdom here. And we’ve heard from Nat and Georgy about their thoughts, which are so helpful. But if you were a community centre with no existing relationships or maybe a few existing relationships, but almost none with 18 to 30 year olds,

So there’s maybe not a leader that you can draw on and ask these questions for your context. Where would you go first to connect in with this age group? What would the first conversations look like? Clarissa, do you want to have a go first?

Clarissa Baker   36:05

Or is there any chance Willow and Lily can go first? I feel like I need, I don’t know if you’ve got, can get the ball rolling for me.

Lauren Bonnet   36:10

Yeah.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   36:11

Are we?

Mhm.

Um, yeah, so I think, um…

that like the community spaces, well, we would call them like third spaces or DIY activist artist spaces and things like that, where we’re all congregating and doing our work sometimes can be hard to find if you don’t know what to search for on like Instagram or Mastodon or whatever.

Lauren Bonnet   36:35

Mm.

 

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   36:39

hard to find. But the thing is, is that there are spaces that are like connected to us that are run by people that are like 40 plus, like there are, you know, spaces that we go to and visit, but it’s mostly older people. So like Share House, which is in the

in the North Adelaide train, Port Adelaide train station that’s run by all older people who we’re not really involved with, but they would know about us. They know about us, they know about Tabby, they know about all the other places. So I would go to the older people, the places where people are doing…

radical, you know, progressive things and ask them, where are all the kids at, you know? And then they will tell you that, I don’t know, that’s what I would do. Yeah, so basically just reach out to.

Community spaces, other community spaces. Yeah, more public present community spaces that might be easier to find.

They all know each other. Yeah.

Lauren Bonnet   37:39

Mm.

Yeah, so maybe the starting point is mapping out where are people actually gathering, where are young people gathering, where are people already doing great work? Start there and then go from there. Clarissa, as a prompt, when we met up before this, you had a great idea around the environmental space, I guess, and how they

have places that gather and how they make people feel welcome, how people find out about them, how centres could be useful to environmental groups in particular. Maybe that can lend a little bit of direction if you haven’t already thought of amazing ideas like you have.

Clarissa Baker   38:27

Yeah, sorry, this is a really hard one.

I mean, what definitely makes me feel welcome in a space was like having a welcome desk with like name tags and like having a dedicated person to like show you around and share what’s happening in the space. And also just like having people that are also like their for a role, but also like there just to be friends with you as well. Like, it’s like, yeah, I’m not here just to show you around, but I’m also here to like, we can be friends kind of thing. That’s not really answering the question. Sorry, I’m feeling like this question. I’m not, I’m not feeling fully like across what can.

Lauren Bonnet   39:11

Yeah. Maybe we’ll ask it differently. So if you were running a community centre and there was no one in your community centre that was your age, how would you go about finding people that are your age? Where are they gathering? What online tools maybe?

or what is actually meaningful for for your generation in why they would want to engage. Why would they actually want to utilize a community centre or how could a community centre be useful to them?

Clarissa Baker   39:47

Yeah, I guess a lot of people I’ve noticed, lots of young people are really keen to do things and get together with people or start projects, but they just need the space to do it. And often these

spaces are like, you need to hire them for like $100 an hour, or they’ve already got programming in them, like they’ve already got the Thursday yoga class in them, so you can’t use the space. So I think there are a lot of people who are really keen to get out and do things and start

things and they just need a space. I think that’s where community centres can come in. So really just opening your doors up and just saying, hey, look, I’ve got this space. You guys can do whatever you want with it or what do you want to do with it? Really? And then just literally, I think as it was already mentioned, like just then

stepping back and just letting that happen. And there’s lots of good group chats like environmental wise. There’s like a Sage Community Group and we have this group chat where anyone can join and then you can share things and post things of what

what you’re doing, or if you want something, someone to come along to something, you can ask people to come along. So there’s, yeah, once you’re part of those sorts of group chats that often happen on Signal, which is a

like a group chat messaging platform. Then, yeah, you realise there’s actually quite a lot of people doing a lot of things. And so, yeah, just connecting in with those people and saying, hey, I have a space that you could use. That’s really all, maybe all you need.

Lauren Bonnet   41:45

Ohh.

Yeah, that’s great. We’re going to decode some of what Clarissa just said with signal and all of that in a sec in the next question. Thank you. But I thought I’d just throw to Nat and Georgy. When we’re talking about bridges to this age group, I’m thinking like, what about in Services?

land. Who are the who are the orgs or the professionals that we could potentially connect in with in our neighborhoods?

Georgy Rochow   42:22

You wanna go first now?

Natalie Matulick   42:25

Sure. So yeah, I would think about where young people are congregating. So kind of backing up what Willow and Lilia said and Clarissa too, it’s around how can you connect in with young people, where are they already connecting? So places has kind of been talked about and I loved Clarissa’s point too around online connection points where young people are congregating online.

But you could also think about services. So over 18, they may be engaged in TAFEs, universities, things like that. So you could go and talk, you could put up posters, you could connect in there. You could also connect with key staff so that they can relay the information to their students.

Or they might be engaged with service providers. So there are a whole range of service providers who provide a whole range of services for young people. So think your Mission Australia, your SYCs, there are a whole heap and it depends which region you’re in as to really who’s prominent in those regions. But I’d…

connect in with local service providers because then they can share that information directly with the young people that they’re working with. So it’s really kind of getting that word of mouth thing going. So it might be that you’re connecting in with the adults or the support ecosystem that’s wrapped around young people to help get that information through. So it’s kind of like think about where the young people are, but also think about that ecosystem around them.

Georgy Rochow   43:51

Yeah, I agree with the concept of tapping into the support network and the ecosystem. And I think also if you have some really dope marketing, that really helps, something that’s eye-catching, and then putting it in places where young people are gathering already. And I think libraries are great. I always see a lot of

engagement with content that’s at the libraries, but also councils. I’m a bit biased because I do work for a council, but councils have a lot of spaces that they can promote things in, but they also have a lot of inside intel into different community groups that already exist or people that are.

calling up and asking about, hey, I’ve got a young adult who’s really interested in X, Y, Z, is there a community group somewhere that they can go to? And then also Headspace is great. There’s so many Headspaces across the whole of Australia and I find that young adults that are engaging

with Headspace are also maybe people who are seeking community as well. So they might be going in for some mental health support, but they’re also kind of lonely. And that’s what we talked about at the beginning was this generation can be a bit lonely and people who are seeking community, I mean, they’re community centres. So it’s a really nice way to get people through the door.

But yeah, just finding services that already exist and connecting all together is a really good way to do it.

Lauren Bonnet   45:25

Great. I feel like we could spend an hour talking about this and I guess I’d just throw in, here’s an opportunity for us as a sector and our other friends who are online, if you’re not from community centres, to gather and actually map these things out as regions or as collectives of community centres so that the burden is not all in one centre to do it or

10 centres are not going to the same places. Divine and conquer use our resources collectively. So maybe that’s the next part of this. You let us know as we go. I want to visit this digital realm, which I know from conversations with centres across the last year is a space that is really

complex and mind-boggling and some, it’s just too much for some and others are really into it. I would love to hear Willie and Lily, can you please tell us what is a digital community or why would someone want to be involved in a digital community? Maybe there’s an example you could use

Illustrate that.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   46:31

You wanna do?

Could you refine the question for me? It’s just… No, that’s like…

Lauren Bonnet   46:38

So, oh yeah.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   46:39

Oh, I can explain what it is, and then you do the examples. Oh, yeah, I can. OK, so digital community is where people who have similar interests, who are like-minded, can gather online in group chats or servers and things, and they can all discuss. their, you know, similarities or plan or organized together. Yeah, so it’s a community of people with something in common, then it’s online. They might not be anywhere near each other or they might be really close, but it’s online. Yeah. So what’s an example of that? An example of that, we have DJS, which is just Digital Justice Society.

It’s like sort of, how often do they have meetings? They have meetings, I think, every month now. Every month, yeah. And it is about digital justice and trying to get away from big tech like Instagram and Facebook and other things.

and also have some sense of security online. That one is greatly like internet based, like digital based. Where do they gather? Where do they gather? Yeah, so where is that community based online?

We, they have what signal, is it signal? That’s a signal one, yeah, so that’s another signal chat, which is an encrypted messaging-based platform, and then other places like the server stuff, so we the Minecraft and things, yeah, that’s the Minecraft stuff, yeah, we we made a Minecraft server for people to.

come together and play on sort of to like bring people together just online as well. Yeah, so people who might be far away. So we’ve got some people who live north and they’ll be on there and they can talk to each other and, you know, work together and do things on there. And then there are other places like on Discord is still heavily used. So there’s a lot of people who don’t come to Tabby Gallery, which is in

in Adelaide in the city, who you might never see, but they’re always on the Discord and they put input into the goings on of the places that they have. Yeah, they have input and they make change, but they’re not actually here. Yeah.

Lauren Bonnet   48:56

Mm.

Willow & Lilly (Rewind)   48:57

Yeah, any other? Um, that’s pretty good. That’s pretty much it, yeah.

Lauren Bonnet   48:58

Claire.

Yeah, I think that’s given us a starting point for sure. I’m already hearing people go, define discord. So actually, maybe Clarissa, this is a good segue into your world, I guess, and how the digital and the physical meet.

You mentioned that in the environmental groups that you’re part of, there’s often an online component to it, but then you gather in person. I’m wondering what that looks like. How do they connect with each other?

 

Clarissa Baker   49:37

Yeah, so very practically with Bob Brown Foundation, we have like 2 signal chats. The first one is a chit chat. So you can just put like, you can just chat to each other, essentially. It’s usually about something that we’re doing, but it could also just be like, oh, hey, do you want to hang out on the weekend or

You know, it can really just be, it’s just a nice chit chat. But then there’s also the more formal group chat, which is to watch the date, time and location of the next meeting. That’s about all that goes in there is just essentially where we should all rock up to get together in person.

next time. And then maybe some key meeting notes that we should all be across. So that’s sort of a bit more like sort of a bit more formal, I guess, and only a few admin people are there to can contribute to that chat. So then, yeah, that’s mostly how I interact.

with sort of the online space is more really to use it to find out what’s happening and then where I can show up to an in-person thing.

Because I, yeah, I think in person things for me, I feel much more connected. I feel like I’m already too addicted to scrolling on my phone. And that’s a whole issue in itself for me. So just trying to actually keep off of my phone is actually better for my mental health.

But also what Lily, oh my gosh, now I’m getting the names mixed up. Willow and Lily were saying about being on those online group chats, if you live far away, actually sounds really meaningful. As someone that does live far, like decently far away from the city, that could actually be something that maybe I should look into. So

Yeah, both have a place, I think.

 

Lauren Bonnet   51:35

Well, Bec and I try and rewire what on earth we’re doing here, because I’ve got a ton of follow-up questions, but I’m going to hand over to you, Bec.

Rebecca Cox   51:39

Well, I mean, super rogue, Lauren, super rogue. And who expected we were going to coin some new names for people today? That’s an unexpected outcome, but that’s great. We do have a couple of minutes for Q&A. If there’s any burning questions, please throw them quickly in the Q&A box at the top of your screen and we’ll happily

share them with our guests to answer before we move on.

Am I seeing any? I’m not seeing the dots of the dots of conversation there, so I will.

I will perhaps move to wrap up. Lauren, I’m looking at your face. Yes.

Lauren Bonnet   52:17

I’ve just got one further follow-up question for Georgy in particular, because I’m just thinking if maybe if I was a centre, I’d be going, okay, you’ve just mentioned all these platforms, but we don’t use those platforms. How does Northern Sound System use the online platforms to share about their work with this age group and potentially engage in a different way?

 

Georgy Rochow   52:40

Yeah, well, there’s been a bit of change recently since the age restrictions came in to social media. So we had predominantly most of our young adults were engaging with our content through Instagram. And that’s how they’d find out what was on and come to shows and ask questions about studio hire and stuff.

Recently we switched to having a newsletter, so it’s a bit old school, but people sign up and we send out a newsletter about what’s going on and any sort of like fun little stories in there as well. And then we do use Discord as well as a place for participants that come in for our programs to be able to

chat about the projects that they’re working on in a kind of moderated environment as well. And it can get a bit tricky because we are working with a lot of under 18s as well. So we’re always trying to find platforms where there’s multiple adults in there as well to make that all run smoothly. But yeah, I would say that we don’t have a very strong

online engagement for Northern Sound System. A lot of it is face to face and in real life. But we always try to have some options for accessibility as well. And looking at that a lot with our events coming up and how we can improve on live streaming things to YouTube and having ways for people to engage in

what’s happening in our space if they can’t make it out of bed that day or maybe they live really far away or maybe they just don’t want to be around people. But yeah, we’re still kind of dipping our toes into the online spaces ourselves. I think it’s really important to have both as places for people to meet, but as much as possible. We love to get people through our doors and

And welcome the moon and build that face-to-face connection where we can.

Hope that answered the question.

Lauren Bonnet   54:40

It did. Thank you very much.

Rebecca Cox   54:46

So I don’t know about you, but I’ve taken lots of notes while people have been talking today about everything from yes, as a default answer. I love that. And giving away power in decision making and what that might look like in different spaces. I think that’s a real challenge for

for community centres that can be so entrenched in governance and good decision making practices and, you know, ticking all the boxes to really make space and time for these really genuine connections and input and influence from this age group. So I just want to say thank you so much to all of our guests on our panel today.

What a conversation and great content it has been. Thank you so much. Your generosity of time and your honesty today has been really appreciated. Thank you. Just a reminder, we are sharing, we are recording today’s session and we will share that after the event. So if you want to revisit anything or share the session with others, please feel free to do that. We’ll be sending out the link. It’ll be available.

via our website. But I do want to take a minute and just acknowledge that today is just a starting point. So if, like me, you’ve had a few moments where you’ve gone, oh, yeah, that’s something that we need to do better, or there’s a thread there that we can follow, or that’s a conversation I’d like to follow up with, and that’s a point I’d like to know more about, please do so, because today was really just the start of this conversation.

a really broad look at something that deserves a lot more of our time and attention. And I also want to acknowledge that there’s already great work going on in this space. So particularly from our Community Connections partners that have shown interest in exploring what really genuine engagement with this age group looks like in their regions. And for example,

in Southern Metro CCP partners met recently with service providers and local government community centres to workshop what that engagement might look like and work collaboratively to identify and map out what those resources are. And that’s the kind of regional type approach that, you know, that this session might lead to more broadly. So that some of that work is already happening.

across our state. So after today’s session, we are going to be sending out an evaluation form for both the session itself in terms of the mechanism of today and how it worked for you or didn’t, but also the topic and what you’d like to do with it from here, how you’d like to take it forward. And that’s the bit that gets really juicy for us around, you know, what is it that sparked your interest? What have been your moments of

of learning or clarity today that you want to follow through and how can we support that conversation to happen. So please take a second just to let us know your interest in the feedback form. It’s not a hard form, it doesn’t take very long just to send it through back to us so we know where you’re at and how your centre might benefit from a further conversation.

I really do thank our panellists so much for your time today. You have all spoken exceptionally well. Thank you so much for sharing your perspectives and your thoughts on what we can do better as a community centre sector in engaging this age group. It’s been a really great experience getting to hear all of you speak to your topics. So thank you so much.

And that wraps up our session.