CMY and Orygen collaborates on policy report to support multicultural young people’s mental health
On 21 July, CMY in collaboration with Orygen launched the collaborative policy report ‘Supporting multicultural young people’s mental health.‘ The event was hosted at Orygen’s Parkville office with a room full of youth workers, policy change makers and mental health industry experts.
The report explores how racism, socio-economic disadvantage, immigration instability, trauma and structural barriers come together to create poor mental health outcomes for multicultural young people. It proposes new solutions to improve young people’s access to the mental health care system and improve their lives holistically.
The launch was emceed by Reverb 2.0 Youth Advocate Adriel, who also moderated a panel discussion. He opened the launch with an Acknowledgement of Country, including an important reminder to centre the voices of First Nations people in discussions about mental health.
Peta Fualau, CMY’s Executive Manager for Programs & Services, introduced the work that went into the research and highlighted the journey of creating this report. The report itself was a follow-up to an earlier report ‘Responding together: Multicultural young people and their mental health.’ Peta mentioned the importance of centring culture in mental health care.
“We must remind ourselves that we have to continue to see culture as a strength, not as a barrier and not as an add-on to a young person’s identity.”
Senator Jana Stewart provided government’s perspective on the report punctuating the Labor government’s more than $750 million investment over last 4 years into improving mental health outcomes for young people across Victoria. A proud Mutthi Mutthi and Wamba Wamba woman, Senator Stewart stressed that a sense of belonging is the key to better mental health outcomes for young people.
“Every young person deserves to feel like they belong, that they are understood and that support will be there when they need it.”
Dr. David Baker then provided context for the policy report. Head of Policy at Orygen, he gave an overview of the research, how it was obtained and what it tells us. He also reflected on what the research could do to improve the lives of multicultural young people who have so many barriers when navigating the system.
“When services are disconnected, young people and their families face the back and forth of a maze rather than a pathway to follow.”
The event was concluded with a panel discussion bringing together young experts, researchers, and youth workers who see the effects of the mental health system on multicultural young people every day.
On the panel was Anjalie Almeida, a Youth Advocate with CMY’s Reverb 2.0 program. There was Tigist Kebede, Co-Founder and Senior Trauma Counseller at Pola Practice, a mental health, wellbeing and consulting practice that provides holistic and culturally responsive mental health care to marginalised people in Melbourne’s west. And Karen Block, Head of the Migration and Health Unit at the Nossal Institute for Global Health at the University of Melbourne.
Prompted with questions by Adriel, the three panelists discussed a range of topics inspired by the research provided in the policy report. Anjalie, Tigist and Karen talked about current problems, potential solutions and what the future looks like for multicultural young people’s mental health care in Australia.
“You cannot have holistic mental health care without considering where culture plays in their lives and in their future. It’s so nuanced. There’s so many layers to it,” Anjalie said.
“Care means that our community is engaged. We have people not dropping out of high school or primary school. We have accessible public transport…When our young people can go on a basketball court and not have the police called on them, that is when someone can have great mental health care,” said Tigist.
“We have to really sustain support and funding for approaches that are working. I understand that they take time and that maybe the next new shiny thing is what we need but, we need to keep developing what we have and keep building in that evidence space,” Karen said.
This report is a collaboration between Orygen and CMY. Read the full report here.