Reconnect

Waltja’s Reconnect program has been supporting the young people in Papunya, Mount Liebig, Titjikala, and Ltyentye Apurte (Santa Teresa) since 2001. We work with young people between 12 and 18 years old, who are at risk of homelessness to feel safe, reconnect with their family and community, and to build a strong future. This service is funded by the Australia Government Department of Social Services.

 Good News Story:  An 18 years old (female) approached a Waltja worker expressing she wanted to get a job in her community, Papunya. She had completed year 12 and had just returned back to her home. She said she had been homesick and now wants to work in her own homeland. The worker supported her to get her IDs, Tax File Number and bank account set up as an initial step to be job ready. We then went on to the local stakeholders to seek employment opportunities. She was able to secure a job in a community store. Her next goal is to save up from her job to buy herself a car. 

Family Mental Health Support Services

FMHSS

Waltja’s FMHSS program aims to support children and young people from 0-18 years old, who are showing early signs of, or are at risk of developing, mental illness, to improve well-being and enable them to better participate in their communities and reach their full potential. This program is funded by the Australian Government Department of Social Services accessible to three communities, Ltyentye Apurte (Santa Teresa), Titjikala and Apatula (Finke). The program focuses on improving the mental health and well-being, enabling the capacity of young people and their families to better manage the impact of mental illness, and supporting families and carers to care for their children and young people with mental illness. Our staff provide flexible and responsive services to address the social and environmental factors that lead to mental health conditions for children and young people when signs or symptoms of poor mental health first appears.

Suicide Prevention

Waltja delivered 2 workshops with women and young girls in Aputula in 2021. The 2 workshops delivered were co-facilitated by elders targeting young girls and women. During the 2 women’s workshops key objectives were met, including discussing safe places for young women and older women to go in the community, safe people to talk with when having big worries and what help is available outside of community. Collaborative paintings to share the story of Waltja-Tjutangku Tjungkunku Kanyintjaku Tjananya were also generated. In the initial phase, Waltja successfully undertook planning, promotion, and preparations in collaboration with key elders and community members prior to the workshops. Similar workshops were planned and delivered in Papunya and Mount Liebig in 2019 and 2020, where the elders led the workshops to create paintings highlighting safety of young people and safe places and people to go to when they have big worries.

Bike Workshop

Alice Springs Police donated around 20 BMX and other mountain bikes to Waltja for the FIX EM UP project at Aputula community. Mel and Chris also went to the Alice Springs Tip Shop with a trailer and loaded it up full of more bikes.

As soon as Mel arrived in the community the interest was over whelming! Local lads, Colin, Ashwyn and Lincoln took the lead and organised people fixing the bikes.  They were all fixed in just two days !!!

Mel visited the school and sat with the upper and lower primary youth who all came together to design t-shirts for the bike project. The week after Mel returned with the students designs and they screen printed lots of t-shirts. Young people were proud of the bikes they fixed up and were keen to start riding and learning the road rules.

The bike program was such a success that no young person wanted to be without their bike and even the parents wanted one to ride around the community. It’s great when everyone comes together to support each other.

Bush Medicine

We went out to half-way dam towards Finke River other side chamber pillar.

We went out to look for the bush plant Atjilitja. This plant is good for joint pain and sores. We went out with our old ladies from Titjikala. It’s very important to go out and visit our country and teach our young kids how to look for bush medicine and what to look for.

Uwa Nganana arnu Ngurra ini half-wayla kutu Panya meditjina putitja mantjilkitja Manula kungka-warra Tjuta Katingu ngurra nintilkitja yaltji yaltji tjamunya munu kaminya nyinapai mai putitjangka

Screen Printing

The most liked workshops by young people in every community, it’s fun, messy, and colourful! Waltja staff have organised tee-shirt and jumper screen printing activities in Titjikala, Aputula, Papunya, Mount Liebig and Atitjere communities. Prior to screen printing, the young people sketch and draw designs they would like to see on their tee-shirts. Waltja staff then selected the common theme and created a screen with a design that represents the skill and engaged in positive activities with their peers.

Sewing Workshop

Waltja workers went to Papunya in the October school holidays and ran a kungkas sewing workshop. The MacYouth team were a great help in running this program. Shona, Justine and Parveen from MacYouth helped tell people about the workshop and explain everything to the girls that came along.

The sewing workshop went for 2 afternoons. On the first afternoon, everyone learnt how to sew together material to make backpacks. There were many different stations, and everyone did some measuring, cutting, sewing on the machine and ironing. At the end of the first day, everyone had made their own backpack.  

The next afternoon everyone came back and did final touches on making the backpack. Then we painted designs on the backpacks. There were really great designs – there was some dot painting, flowers designs, and some people even did their own ‘Nike’ style backpacks.

There was also lots of food for afternoon tea each afternoon, and dancing for TikTok. Some of the backpacks even made their way into some of the TikToks. One of the girls said, “I thought that sewing was going to be boring, but it was actually fun!”. 

NAIDOC Week

Every July NAIDOC week celebrations are run all across Australia, in order to celebrate the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This year, Waltja helped to organise a great NAIDOC Week Celebration in Mt Liebig, with help from Mac Youth, Purple House, and lots of young people!

 In 2021, the celebration included a screen-printing workshop followed by a community BBQ. Waltja bought lots of black jumpers, with the idea of screen printing a design on the jumpers that represents and celebrates the lives and culture of young people in Mt Liebig.

 A couple of weeks before the event, Waltja workers headed out to Mt Liebig to find out what everyone thought. During their visit they ran a drawing activity with lots of young people at the rec hall. Everyone drew what they thought should be screen printed on the jumpers. There were so many great ideas and beautiful drawings. Almost everyone drew something about the Saint’s, showing just how important footy is!

 Waltja took little bits of everyone’s drawings to make one design for printing. Hopefully everyone could find a little bit of their ideas in the final picture.  Waltja headed back to Mt Liebig and had lots of fun screen-printing jumpers with all of the young people.

A big thanks to Mac Youth for helping to put on a BBQ dinner for everyone

Thanks to Purple House for donating to the event and to the National Indigenous Australians Agency (NIAA) for providing a NAIDOC grant.

Christmas BBQ

Around 150 people joined in the Christmas BBQ organised by Waltja, supported by MacYouth and CDP. The community members enjoyed a big feed, drinks, and gospel songs. The young people were running around, dancing and having a good time. 

 The community members worked tirelessly to prepare salad, organising the ‘giveaway gifts’, decorating the Christmas tree, serving food, taking pictures. MacYouth assisted in organising the music equipment and transporting people. CDP offered a venue for the BBQ, giveaway gifts, built a stage for the Gospel, provided additional supplies of food and drinks, helped in cooking up, set up marquee, and transported music equipment. A big thanks to the community and stakeholders for their time and assistance.

Art Sales

Waltja Nintipulka (Getting Clever)

Central Australia is the land of Aboriginal Arts and Artists. Unfortunately, it is seen commonly that Aboriginal Arts is predominantly managed by non-Aboriginal people. Waltja Nintupulka project is designed with a focus on capacity building in Aboriginal Arts management. This project incorporates a Senior Aboriginal Worker, who will train trainees to develop their skills as future art workers and potential shop front managers. The trainees will also have opportunities in upskilling through accredited training. The program will enhance the capacity of trainees by developing skills such as:

• Stock management
• Artwork data entry and database management
• Sales management via shopfront, markets, events or online
• Marketing and promotion
• Customer service and administration

Media Training

The media trainee works in supervision of Waltja’s media team they are trained to design and edit website, photography skills, photo editing skills, catalogue designs, and Newsletter designing. The media trainee also takes part in community visits with field workers, where they can learn about the local culture, engage, and transfer their skills to the young people. The training also incorporates marketing and sales of products in Waltja’s art sales.

Finance Training

Waltja has been supporting disadvantaged youth to come onboard and learn skills on finance management. Our finance officer supports trainees in developing crucial skills in finance and helps them to get accreditation in finance and business.