who we work with
Genesis Youth Trust works with children and young people aged 10 years to 18 years who have come to the attention of the Police for a number of reasons.
Police Youth Aid and Youth Engagement Officers from various Counties Manukau and East Auckland Police stations refer the young people through to our teams for a comprehensive assessment followed by a focused multi-disciplinary team intervention.
As well as working with the young person who is referred, Genesis is also able to work with the wider whānau. This is crucial, given that many of our clients come from lower socio-economic families with issues that can include generational dysfunction, generational offending, gang affiliations, alcohol and drug addictions, anger issues, low literacy and numeracy levels, truancy, broken families, unemployment and mental illness.
Genesis endeavours to get young people work ready and into employment as part of our Youth to Work and World of Work programmes which are funded by the Ministry of Social Development.
social workers - our drivers of change
Our Social Workers are central to the delivery and coordination of our services. Our Social Workers reflect the communities they serve and many of them live and work within the same community.
Our Social Workers work on building rapport with the young person and their family and help to introduce them to our support services. They play a key role in gathering the relevant information to inform our initial and ongoing validated assessments and targeted intervention plans.
mentors – our relationship and youth engagement specialists
Our Mentors team are the experts in establishing and maintaining genuine relationships with our young people. They come from varying backgrounds including: youth workers, psychologists, sportsmen and sportswomen, and musicians. Each of our mentors has a heart for reconnecting our young people with positive role models and pro-social activities.
Our Mentors run a number of mentoring programmes throughout the year including one on one mentoring and group programmes that are strengths-based, gender specific, and gender mixed where appropriate. Our one on one mentoring programme is based on the young person’s goals and key areas relating to reducing risks, addressing specific needs, and building protective factors. Our group mentoring programme is an opportunity to build a mentoring family, look at gender specific issues, learn life skills, cultural identity and is also developed to help address identified needs.
counsellors - our heart surgeons
Our Counsellors are our heart surgeons and focus on getting to the root cause of our young people’s behaviour. They work with our young people through one on one counselling sessions, and also with our families through our whanau-focused programmes. Our Counselling and Family Services Programmes work on supporting our young people and their families to learn strategies for dealing with their emotions and experiences, and building on their strengths as a family.
whānau programme
Our team of Counsellors has partnered with the Parenting Place to run the Building Awesome Whanau Programme for our young people and families. This programme is tailored to Maori and Pasifika families and delivered in a way that is non-judgmental and easy to engage with.
Genesis has also partnered with the Parenting Place to develop a co-designed whanau programme which is specific to offending young people and their families. This is an exciting project with the potential to have real impact amongst vulnerable whanau and those who historically have been more difficult to engage with, and it also has the potential for much greater reach in future.
nz police referrals
For young people referred by Police Youth Aid, they receive an enhanced intervention that differs from what we have done previously in that they now go through a thorough validated psychological assessment to assess their risks, protective factors and needs. This psychological assessment tool (which Genesis is pioneering the use of within Social Work in New Zealand) then generates the key priority areas that our team will work towards addressing, through a multi-disciplinary approach.
Each young person referred under this service is assigned a Social Worker, Mentor and Counsellor. Through this multi-disciplinary approach, our team now have the opportunity to work holistically with the young people who has been referred and their family. This intervention is also unique in that it allows the young person to engage with our services for a minimum of six months, and up to 12 months.