The lead up to Christmas was made more special by a group of young people with a disability who have helped double the number of food hampers to the homeless.
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The presentation of 100 hampers to the Wollongong Homeless Hub was made at their graduation from the Greenacres School Leaver Employment Supports program, Kickstart Careers.
They and their family’s amazing effort resulted from a visit to the Homeless Hub where the Kickstart participants found out how many homeless people there are in the city and how tough their life can be. Since that visit they have been committed to a mission of giving out 100 food hampers at Christmas.
In the process the young people with a disability engaged the Greenacres community, made posters, put out collection bins for canned food, approached local businesses for donations and even spent a day washing cars to raise money.
Wollongong Homeless Hub’s Mandy Booker said the impact of what the young people with a disability have done was incredible because it will make a huge impact on so many people this Christmas.
“We are actually now able to increase our load from 100 hampers to now doing 250 hampers this year for our homeless,” she said.
Federal Cunningham MP Sharon Bird and Shellharbour State MP Anna Watson described the students with a disability at Greenacres as “amazing young people”.
“They are not only inspiring for what they have achieved over the year with their certificates and their job placements,” Ms Bird said.
“But also their great friendship and what they have done for the Homeless Hub”.
Ms Watson said she loved coming to the graduation at Greenacres every year and seeing the hopes and dreams of so many young people with a disability in the community being realised. “And as you have seen these are young people with such big hearts who have done so much with such little money. It doesn’t get better than this. What a great job”.
Training and Employment Placement senior coordinator Arjah-Learh McGrath said the group worked hard for months to create the hampers around an already busy schedule learning work and life skills.
“We’ve been so impressed with the dedication the Kickstart Careers participants have given to this cause and their strong desire to make a difference in the lives of people struggling this Christmas. The Kickstart Careers program is all about smoothly transitioning participants into working life and an undertaking like this improves their confidence, builds on their skills and most importantly, gives them that wonderful feeling of making a contribution and being valued for it.”
The school leavers’ also took the opportunity to thank local businesses who have supported them with mentoring and work experience.
“We can’t say thank you enough to these local businesses and the individual staff members who have given up their time, shared their knowledge and shown patience, understanding and empathy towards our participants. When they have these positive experiences out in the workplace you can just see their confidence grow and they start to get really excited about their future,” Ms McGrath said.
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