We would like to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we meet and work throughout Australia. We pay our respects to Elders past, present, and emerging and acknowledge that sovereignty has never been ceded.
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However, we know that many organisations are looking for better ways to engage young people, particularly those with diverse lived and technical expertise, but often aren’t sure where to start.
In 2021 we focused on our employment and training model for the young people we work with, as we piloted our YLab Immersion Program, a twelve month structured learning and employment program for eight YLab Associates. Through this program we were able to offer increased job security, a cohort experience and more focused technical training. We have learnt a lot from this model and are looking forward to iterating on what it should look like in the future.
This year we also connected passionate, creative and insightful young people with over 44 organisations who wanted to co-design solutions with young people. One of these solutions saw us partner with Learning Creates Australia to hire and train 19 young people aged 15-18 in high schools. These young people were trained and supported to deliver co-design activities in their own school communities to design new education and learning models.
We also worked with different parts of the Victorian State Government to ensure young people were empowered, informed and included on matters relating to COVID-19. These projects saw us build the leadership capacity of young people to be community advocates and leaders, and provide accurate and relevant vaccination information to young people across the state.
We have spent the last few months connecting with our community, partners and thought leaders to understand how we grow our impact in our next three year strategy. Some themes emerging suggest that YLab could play a significant role in not just building young people’s capability to engage with institutions, but also build institutions' capacity to set the right conditions to work with young people more meaningfully. The new strategy will also likely see YLab narrow its focus to ensure we can deliver the greatest impact possible, with young people.
We’d like to acknowledge and thank the clients we’ve worked with in 2021, for your commitment to building solutions not just for, but with young people and your belief in young people as genuine partners in co-design.
Finally, we’d like to thank and celebrate the incredible young people who have contributed their skills, resilience and care to YLab over the past twelve months. YLab exists to deliver on young people’s visions for the future, and we are grateful for all who have contributed theirs.
Brigid Canny
(she/her)
YLab Executive Director
Living and working on unceded Wurundjeri Land
The portion of Associates and broader team members aged 30 and under.
The portion of Associates aged 15–18.
The average age of our Associates.
The number of projects we undertook in 2021.
The number of young people employed as YLab Associates.
The percentage of Associates with a First Nations background.
At YLab, our ultimate goal is to make ourselves redundant. Through each project we undertake, it is our aim that we strengthen connections between young people and our partners, supporting our partners to implement ongoing changes in their sector and embed young people beyond YLab’s engagement.
In 2021, we saw our partners across sectors continue to recognise the importance of embedding young people into the design of services which impact them. Across 57 projects, partners gained direct access to young people’s experiences, insights and knowledge. 67% of these partners are repeat clients. Below are some examples of these projects.
— The Huddle: Meet Me in the Middle Project
The Huddle approached YLab to co-design and prototype social impact initiatives with the Melbourne Youth Alliance — a group of African Australian young people formed by the City of Melbourne. These initiatives explored the challenges in four key areas: education, career, identity and inclusion. YLab designed and facilitated three workshops to understand the needs, challenges and aspirations of eight young people from the Melbourne Youth Alliance. The outcomes of these informed the development of recommendations for the Huddle.
— Deadly Democracy Project
The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) approached YLab to deliver a series of engagements with the intention of increasing voter engagement amongst First Nations communities. Through this partnership, we built a two day workshop that combined the intention of empowering young First Nations leaders with how to implement their leadership within the democratic system. The outcome was an online campaign designed by and for young First Nations voters to be empowered meaningfully vote in upcoming elections.
— COVID-19 Vaccination Toolkit Project, Department of Health
In partnership with the Victorian Government Department of Health, we created the COVID-19 Vaccination Toolkit to provide more accessible and effective resources about COVID-19 vaccinations. Co-designed with young people with disabilities and from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, the toolkit has reached more than 20,000 young people across the country so far.
Illustration from the toolkit by Nina Sepahpour.
2021 saw YLab pilot two key initiatives to strengthen our employment and training offering for young people.
We also continued with our existing Flexible Associate pool where we continued to employ 33 flexible Associates on a casual basis. This pool provided flexible work opportunities for young people with diverse lived experiences to be actively engaged in shifting and changing systems, enabling them to marry project work with their study, other employment, and life.
FYA’s New Work Order shows that young people are now expected to have 18 jobs and six careers throughout their life. Through investing in upskilling Associates with transferable skills and allowing them to choose areas of professional development to focus and grow in, we prepare them for the future of work, and are more equipped to work in systems change, and understand what a good workplace is.
The YLab Immersion program (YIP) was initially co-designed by YLab Associates in 2019 as a way to invest more deeply in career development and to offer more secure work to young people in YLab’s existing cohort. We hired eight Immersion Associates (two of which are First Nations identified roles) who worked part-time to learn new skills and gain meaningful experiences in co-design and facilitation amongst other FYA and YLab specific capabilities.
YIP Associates at the YIP Closing Ceremony
In 2021, we continued our partnership with Learning Creates Australia to recruit, train and embed a cohort of young people between the ages of 15–21 years to co-design solutions and test prototypes to education challenges, in their own schools.
We gained three key learnings for working with a younger cohort of Under 18s:
We have opted for tailored and responsive training, where instead of overwhelming Associates with all information at the beginning, we stagger interactive, and engaging training across the year.
Piloting the Under 18 employment model, came with its various challenges and complexities, but it undoubtedly proved that it’s worthwhile for the impact it has on stale beliefs about the role young people have in the design of the future. Better outcomes emerge when you design with, not for young people.
Learning Creates Community Associates in their weekly check ins.
We're really excited to keep co-designing systems and services with your people and young people in 2022 and beyond. Get in touch with us.
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