The Young Changemakers Program was established by the Inner North Community Foundation (the Foundation) and the Community Bank Clifton Hill – North Fitzroy in 2015 based on similar initiatives run by other community foundations across the globe.
This year, students from Northern College of Arts and Technology and Wurun Senior Campus participated in the Young Chanemakers Program. Learning about their communities, they made recommendations to distribute $45,000 to 9 eligible organisations.
| Organisation | Project | Student Recommended | Student Rationale |
| Big Group Hug | Necessities Needed | $3,000.00 – 10 cots and and 14 tins of baby formula | Students had a high level of empathy towards the babies and families not being able to afford basic items. |
| For Change Co. | Youth Advisory Program | $2,000.00 – supporting young people who had a completed the program in a paid position on the advisory panel. This will fund approximately 1 person through the program. | Students saw many strengths of the program and were impressed with the high success rate of the program |
| Free To Ltd | Leadership Empowerment and Communications Training | $10,000.00 – cover full costs of 7-8 participant hours of training, menu development & practice classes. | They saw refugees and asylum seekers as very marginalised within our society both legally, economically and socially. They wanted to focus on funding this program. |
| Kowanj Australsia | Youth Capacity building development (CALD) | $6,500.00 – Tailored content development $3,500 plus Teaching support / workshops $3000) | The students were excited to fund a large portion of the funding available to this organisation and the project they are running. They wanted to focus on support young CALD people. |
| Lighthouse Foundation | Lighthouse infant mental health-oriented intervention for young parents | $4,300.00 | They decided on funding the Lighthouse the lease out of all 3 because of the level of income and fundraising capacity the Lighthouse has. |
| Muslim Women’s Council Victoria | One Coffee One Chat | $6,900.00 – Coffee connection with women in the community and food relief | Students would have liked to funded this program more, however they wanted to spread the grant monies available. |
| OFFICE AU Limited | Inner-North Biodiversity Network | $5,500.00 (100% requested) | They saw merit in funding the plan in its entirety and felt it was critical to get these plans to local councils asap. |
| Open Table | Open Table v Community Pantry | $3,000.00 – food and household essentials | The students felt that $3,000 would go a long way with Open Table |
| Riding for the disabled Bundoora Park | Riding on | $3,800.00 – Feeding station and new volunteer uniforms. It is mostly run by volunteers. | After meeting with RDA, they got the sense that although it was a larger organisation, that there was a lot of onus on operating costs on each individual site. |
Students were positive about their experience, saying things like:
“I liked that I learnt more about the problems that are currently going on in our community. I am more appreciative for the life I live.” Ella
“I liked that we got to meet the people from the organisations and that we got a chance to make a difference” Jasper
This program is run with support from the Community Bank Clifton Hill – North Fitzroy and other generous locals. With additional funding, more students and groups can benefit! Get in touch with Ben, EO at the Foundation if you would like to give, or make a donation here.