YOUTH’ANK Hubs
Over the past three years MWLP has worked at refining a Work Placement delivery model to overcome the challenges faced in providing quality work placement for Business Services students. The model is based on three elements:
- MWLP taking on the role of Host Employer
- The establishment of a social enterprise, supported by MWLP to intentionally tackle social problems or improve communities
- The identification and engagement of an organisation that will benefit from the enterprise.
The duration of the project varies in relation to the number of Business Services students requiring placement.
Our previous enterprise projects include:
- Supply A Nappy (2022) – 5 weeks (40 placements)
- Undies Aware (2022) – 9 weeks (79 placements)
- Operation FOOD DRIVE (2021) – 7 weeks (73 placements)
- BREAKFAST READY! (2021) x 2 – 5 weeks (83 placements
- Snack Packs 4 U (2021)
- COLLECT A Nappy (2020) – 4 weeks (30 placements)
- COLLECT A Nappy (2019) – 5 weeks (36 placements)
- Gift a Farming Family (2019) – 4 weeks (23 placements)
The programs typically run from 5-8 weeks (dependent on need) with 8-12 students attending per week. Partner charity organisations to date have been The Salvation Army and Vinnies.
Other ideas for future programs include:
- winter woollies (socks, scarfs, beanies)
- school supplies (pens, pencil cases, notebooks etc),
- pet food drives (people in need often have pets as companions but struggle to feed them).
Once the concept is identified with the partner charity the program is formulated around that need. A social enterprise is set up by the students who carry out all necessary activities for fundraising towards a set target under the guidance of an MWLP appointed supervising coordinator.
Aside from the main campaign there are a number of activities that take place each week. These include:
- Formal induction on Mondays – Policies and Procedures, what to wear, arriving and leaving, expectations and team building activities.
- Individual marketing – discuss how to use personal contacts to engage in the program. Students make flyers, posters, emails, texts etc as needed to collect donations from personal contacts such as schools, friends, family, neighbours, part time jobs, sports teams etc.
- Shopping – any money collected from individual marketing is used to purchase whatever is being collected.
- Pizza Lunch – each Friday pizza is shared with the team for students to experience a company lunch.
- Other training activities are conducted as needed depending on the skills of the students.
