The Rotary E-Club Serving Humanity, NSW, (D9705) has over half a dozen important international projects and just one local project, which serves youth in Port Stephens, NSW. In December 2021, Youth Mental Health – jupiter (RABS) was recognised as a RAWCS project. The Rotary Club of Medowie-Williamtown, NSW, (D9670) is the local partner for the project.
The jupiter project provides an early intervention mental health counselling service to youth aged 12-21 years in the Port Stephens LGA, typically treating anxiety and depression. Its goal is to enable young people to strengthen mental health outcomes and improve wellbeing. The jupiter service is currently provided free at three locations by qualified staff paid for by registered charity Caring for Our Port Stephens Youth (COPSY) Inc. Since the start of the service in March 2019, more than 200 youth have been helped over 1,000 individual sessions.
Jupiter focuses on youth because mental health issues are likely to be first experienced in these younger years. Early intervention provides skills for coping better now, and averting problems in later life.
The service is vital: there are over 10,000 young people in the Port Stephens LGA; a geographically disadvantaged rural and remote region. The free headspace services in Newcastle and Maitland are nearly three hours away by bus. COVID-19 resulted in demand for mental health services increasing by 69 per cent in the period June to September 2020 compared to the same period the previous year.
The long-term goal of jupiter is for Port Stephens youth to feel supported and empowered through self-awareness and awareness of their potential.
Caring for Our Port Stephens Youth (COPSY Inc.) is seeking expressions of interest for an updated study of the mental health needs of youth in Port Stephens. This is a Rotary project (RABS 12-2021-22), which has been going three years. They are looking not only for input on the terms of reference for such a study but also for organisations that would be interested in conducting the study. Emails and questions should be addressed to secretarycopsy@gmail.com
Jupiter held an enormously successful fundraiser on February 15, with more than 140 people attending, raising pledges worth over $100,000 and educating local benefactors about what the group is doing. The event was hosted for free by the Shoal Bay Country Club at its Greek restaurant, Atmos, and compered by ‘Captain Beryl’ (pictured with COPSY’s newest committee member and jupiter Youth Ambassador Astro Alissi). Contributing to the success of the afternoon were guest speakers John Eales, Nick Newling (a popular advocate on youth mental health) and Stephen Hunt (philanthropist and winner of the 2021 NSW Business Leader Award). It now costs around $200,000 a year to provide free youth mental health counselling and wellbeing services across the three sites and through telehealth. While jupiter is grateful for the grants they have received, public donations and events will be key to the future of the service.