BackTrack Youth Works

‘Backtrack: Chasing Dreams’ out now 🐾🎥 To mark the end of an incredible year, we’ve created an update to the award winning documentary ‘BackTrack Boys’. See where some of the original boys are 6 years on, meet a few of our current young people and hear from Bernie and our amazing team about our own hopes and dreams for the future. Watch, share and donate here: https://lnkd.in/gYaa5N53 🙏🏼

Backtrack’s youth work methodology is based on the Circle of Courage model - focusing on Belonging, Mastery, Independence and Generosity. When these 4 quadrants are in balance we can access healing, growth and wellbeing. Our Paws Up program provides opportunities in all 4 of these areas and the outreach component hones in on Generosity. Lately - as well as regularly visiting remote primary schools with the dogs to connect and read with younger children, our Paws Up pack have been visiting a local Aged Care Facility. Before the first visit, our kids were nervous and not sure what to expect. On their return, young Boyd pumped his chest with his fist, ‘that felt GOOD’. When we give back, we give something so important to ourselves - and these young people (and their very special hounds) have a hell of alot to give! 🐾🐾 #pawsupforever #backtrack #circleofcourage #generosity #givingback

The day you get your L’s is an important milestone for all young people. But at BackTrack it hits different. We can’t tell you how proud we are of this guy - who has worked so hard from a tough starting block, to slowly build up his confidence and his literacy to be able to pass the test this week. It’s something he didn’t think he’d ever be able to do. Our teacher has been working with him one on one, our social enterprise supervisor has been ensuring he has the flexibility he needs at work, our youth work and wellbeing team have been supporting wherever needed and his peers have been pumping up his tyres. Dom - you’ve made all our hearts beat stronger this week. It’s a wide open road mate. Congratulations 🙌🏼 #backtrack #wraparoundsupport #youthwork

It’s #takeyourdogtoworkday every day at BackTrack - whether the CEO likes it or not ☺️ Marcus Watson And actually, productivity and ergonomics aside, we know he’s 100% in, given how integral the BackTrack pack is to our work with young people. (Also - Whisky dog is our Union rep on the Board, so maybe this is a high stakes meeting?) 💼🐾 #woof #backtrack #takeyourdogtoworkday

‘Something special is happening here’ 🐾 Thanks to every one of you who’s behind BackTrack and helping us keep at-risk young people alive, out of jail and chasing their dreams. We rely on the incredible generosity of private philanthropy and donations to keep the lights shining bright at BackTrack. If you can, please consider a tax deductible donation this June: https://lnkd.in/exBJdpN 🙏🏼🐾

Eyes up for the catch! You might call this a job, we call it keeping kids alive, out of jail and chasing their hopes and dreams. BackTrack has a unique opportunity for an experienced EA to work alongside our Founder (Bernie Shakeshaft) and our Head of Funding (Paula Thomson). We’re looking for someone with a can-do attitude and the ability to hustle in a fast paced environment. If booking travel, monitoring a sea of emails and organising all manner of logistics is your thing, this might be the gig for you. You must love kids, dogs and making a real difference. This can be a remote role, 30 hours per week, across 5 days, requiring significant flexibility. For further information or to request a position description, please contact Paula Thomson, 0401 043 007, [email protected]. Applications to include a covering letter and CV by 7 June please. 🐾🐾

So proud of our BackTrack young people, who told their powerful stories to a packed room at last week’s The Chappell Foundation dinner at the Sydney Cricket Ground, raising funds for youth homelessness. The Chappell Foundation have been incredible supporters of BackTrack over many years and we were so honoured that this year they gave the mic to 2 of our young people to share their stories - a really amazing opportunity, and boy did they do us proud. Thanks to Adam Spencer, Adam Gilchrist and all the other VIPS who made a couple of teenagers from Armidale welcome and confident in a very big room! What a night 🙏🏼

Wellbeing is everything at our social enterprise, BackTrack Works. Its whole purpose is to provide the wraparound support and scaffolded pathways needed for our cohort of young people to begin to connect with community, training and real-world work environments. So ensuring there’s space for an impromptu BBQ on any given Friday is more important than you’d think. Huge thanks to our growing list of incredible customers across the government, NFP and business sectors, as well as the individuals in our community who very intentionally engage BackTrack Works in contracts that make longterm, wraparound support possible for at-risk young people. They know they’re investing in so much more than the top notch products and services these crews deliver 🙏🏼🐾 #socialenterprise #backtrackworks #winwinwin

What do you get when you cross an alternative school with a wraparound youthwork organisation? A COW! This here is BackTrack’s Classroom On Wheels in action 🐄🛞🚗 The COW enables our teacher to head out to wherever BackTrack young people are engaged - the farm, the Shed, Warrah, out in the community - and whip out her tailored learning resources and mobile classroom materials faster than you can say ‘reading changes lives.’ Since the COW has been on the road for the last few terms, we’ve seen young people who have been unable to learn in a classroom environment start to really engage, because they can be outside where they’re comfortable, moving around and feeling connected and confident. It’s the last week of term for us here in NSW and the start of Youth Week. Shout outs to our amazing young people and teacher - doing things differently to get the job done. #moooooo #backtrack #alternativeeducation #alive #outofjail #chasinghopesanddreams #youthweek

Check out yesterday’s @abcradionational Life Matters interview to hear Bernie Shakeshaft talking all things BackTrack and our approach to keeping kids alive, out of jail and chasing their hopes and dreams. Here he is in our old Shed a few months back walking staff through the very early days when BackTrack was just a handful of volunteers and a rock solid commitment to the young people falling through the cracks in our town… LISTEN HERE: https://lnkd.in/gcZGvW6x