Panyappi Indigenous Youth Mentoring Program Evaluation

Program outcomes
Multi agency collaboration develops around the young person
Panyappi Indigenous Youth Mentoring Program Evaluation
Panyappi played a key role in establishing the Inner City Triage Group in order to better
coordinate a response to young people who frequent the inner city area. Although one of
the referral sources for Panyappi that could provide useful information on the key
target group, it has been disbanded in favour of a general inner city youth forum which
focuses more on networking rather than cases, although an inner city Aboriginal workers
group is also being supported.
Collaboration in the delivery of direct services appears to be strong in Panyappi. Program
collaborators greatly appreciate access to a unique service that provides a high level of
input into young people who are otherwise likely to disconnect from education and
support services, and further increase the risk they will engage in or be a victim of
crime. Panyappi has developed strong relationships with schools in providing everyday
support for young people, and with family support services, especially through MAYT,
but also other government and non-government agencies.
Panyappi has also made good use of the MAYT Tutorial Centre for those who do not
attend school, or attend inconsistently. They have worked closely with Tauondi College
at Port Adelaide and Nunga IT at The Parks to provide culturally relevant programs that
build young people’s skills and cultural identity, and, where appropriate, have
collaborated with or utilised MAYT run programs.
Despite these achievements there is still some confusion about the roles and
responsibilities of mentors, the long-term and intensive nature of mentoring, and the
extent of the program resources. This was reflected through reports about and from
program collaborators of unrealistic expectations and inappropriate requests of
mentors, and poor clarification of communication and information-sharing protocols. This
may be restraining the achievement of best possible outcomes in some circumstances.
Positive shift in the young person’s behaviour and attitude regarding offending
Panyappi works with young people where there is often an entrenched pattern of
behaviour, even at an early age (by or before 10 years). Both young people and family
members reported a marked change in young people’s offending behaviour. This is clearly
evident in the decreased incidence of offending recorded within the state justice
system’s database for almost all young people (see Figure 9). Where this did not occur it
was because young people could not regularly engage in mentoring as they lived outside
the metropolitan area and only visited it occasionally, or the offending occurred during
their early involvement before they became fully engaged with Panyappi. Some young
people with strong histories of offending and incarceration had not offended at all or
only small incidents had occurred in a six-month period. The young people and their
family members considered this remarkable and were proud as well as slightly surprised.
Mentors and program collaborators supported these statements. Along with family
members, they also indicated that young people’s attitudes had started to shift as they
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