Sarah finds success in never giving up

"When everyone else had given up on me, you were still here." That comment from one of Sarah Taylor's clients is what gets the Masterton youth justice worker through her most challenging times.
"When it gets really hard, I remember that comment and know that what I'm doing does count for something," she said. Being the sole worker managing Project Youth Action - a Masterton Safe and Healthy Community Council scheme launched in 2004 to tackle youth offending in its earliest stages - indeed comes with its challenges.
Ms Taylor, 26, has personally helped more than 70 young people work to break free of crime and set their own goals toward employment and healthier, safer lives. Over the 2008/09 year, the project assisted 29 youth offenders, and most are now back in school, in training, or in work. Only six re-offended during the year and, thanks to the project, one client went from a lifestyle of living on the streets and almost joining a gang to getting a job.
The project has also succeeded in identifying gaps in local services, namely a lack of employment opportunities, no local youth-focussed drug and alcohol rehabilitation residences, insufficient youth mentoring programmes especially for young girls at risk. Cases are referred to the service by Police, Child Youth and Family Services and Strengthening Families these case plans can take between three and 12 months to complete.
She said different clients faced different challenges, although many shared the common threads of drug or alcohol issues, mixed family dynamics, domestic and low socio-economic statuses. "These are kids who obviously face different and serious challenges linked to their offending to be referred by the police."
Ms Taylor liked to take a holistic approach to each case, which meant looking beyond their offending to the wider circumstances of their lives and then assessing whether any other support services could help as well.
"We had one young person who was not connected with his family, we got them onboard, the young person was then able to find his identity which enabled him to find where he belonged, this was the beginning of his change and from here we were able to identify a lot of issues and further support services which could assist him."
After some counselling, some intensive work and a plan that included preparing a CV and job registration was put in place, "and we ended up getting him employed".
Ms Taylor said the major focus was to "empower" the young clients. "It really is about empowering the person to make better decisions for themselves and letting them know they are capable of making those decisions. I'm not here to be the big, bad person - I'm just here to help, and let them know they've got choices." In many cases, clients had spent their whole lives being told what to do, she said.
"People say that it's working. Between 90 to 95 percent of clients complete their plans." She gets a big sense of satisfaction by catching up with past clients and hearing about how they've reversed their lives, or seeing them when they call into her office to get help with little things like CVs.
"With the challenges they are faced with, to see them take control of their lives and say 'I can do this' is rewarding. I've learned that giving them that opportunity means a lot, even though it may be a small thing, it's the small things that count too."