On Monday 4th September, two AIP learner groups from term 2 were honoured with a selection to participate in the Youth Wellbeing Symposium in Wellington.

This opportunity arose from OJC’s Co-design with Lifehack, a Wellbeing Community Initiative.

This event was aimed at connecting those who play a role in influencing the conditions for youth wellbeing. The Symposium brought together policy makers and practitioners in the positive youth development and wellbeing, service providers, politicians, funders, researchers and academics, philanthropists and local government. OJC were lucky enough to be the only Youth presenters at the event.

One of our groups that attended was made up of KDEC learners whose AIP was about the effects of Bullying which was expressed through movement and spoken word. They chose this Inquiry as they had all experienced some form of bullying in their lives and they wanted others to understand the effects it had on people’s wellbeing.

Paris, Ezxyn, Rachelle and April were part of the second group who performed at the Symposium. These girls researched about the Neuroscience of the Teenage Brain and then expressed this through a multimedia dance. The biggest learning came from refining their Term 2 project outcome, making it more coherent for the audience’s understanding, improving the dance elements and having a deeper knowledge of the research they had found.

The whole experience of refining the project in the weeks leading up, flying down to Wellington and presenting their learning in front of a relevant audience was such a powerful learning adventure that was truly authentic. After the Symposium, the learners had the opportunity to visit Te Papa Museum and the Beehive. It was a great example of how learning can affect change and discussion beyond the walls of school.