Students create Blue Tree mural in Raise Program

The Raise program has aimed to help young people navigate the world by providing a mentor program.

To have a mentor to talk to and feel comfortable with can have a significant and lasting impact on a young person’s journey through their formative years.

Narrabri High School and Wee Waa High School are two of only a small number of rural schools involved with the program across NSW.

The 20-week program ran successfully again in 2020 with students at Narrabri High School graduating alongside their trusted mentors at the High School on November 23.

Raise program counsellor Lorna Szymanski said she was pleased with the way the program ran this year.

“It’s been challenging with COVID-19, but we still managed to maintain face-to-face contact with the mentors and mentees,” Ms Szymanski said.

“The program helps the kids increase their self-esteem and teaches respect and who to ask for help within a support system. It also gets them to talk about things they maybe wouldn’t tell their parents or teachers.”

Raise has founded mentor programs throughout NSW, Queensland, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.

Its mission is to impact youth wellbeing and engagement through early intervention in secondary schools.

Alarmingly, suicide is the leading cause of death among young Australians aged 15 to 24.

Unemployment rates are also double that of the general population.

The program aims to benefit young people and positively affect the individuals at the centre of such statistics.

Raise has provided a trained mentor for approximately 6300 young Australians through its history, and in 2020, the program aimed to provide another 1500 mentors across the associated schools.

The mentees identify with a mentor and select their preference at the beginning of the program.

“The program is put together by a psychologist and is quite therapeutic,” Ms Szymanski said.

“We do a number of activities and games, and I’ll ask the mentees who they associated with.”

Raise’s mentoring programs run a community project each year in support of the NSW Department of Communities and Justice’s Youth Frontiers program.

This year the Narrabri and Wee Waa students created murals with their mentors, inspired by The Blue Tree project which was founded by the sisters of a man who took his own life.

Inspired by the foundation, blue trees have been found all across the country serving as a profound image increasing suicide awareness.

The students and mentors unveiled the mural in recognition of the Blue Tree project with the words ‘we are stronger than we believe, braver than we think and loved more than we know’ marked inside the coloured tree.

“Sometimes you’ll be driving in the country and you’ll see a tree painted blue, and it serves as a reminder,” Ms Szymanski said.

“It’s about putting mental health and suicide at the forefront so that people are aware and then people can feel they don’t have to go to that place – they can seek help.”

At the graduation, the mentors spoke highly about their respective students who they have seen grow during the year. Plenty of memories were shared and tears shed.

The organisation will recruit new mentors in December and January in readiness for the 2021 program which will begin at the start of the final week of the first school term.

Training is provided while mentors will convene with a program counsellor over the 20 weeks.

“The more mentors we can get, the more students we can have in the program,” Ms Szymanski said.

To become a mentor go to the Raise website, raise.org.au.