Yarra Term 2 week 7 2025

Hi everyone and welcome to the final blog for term 2 2025!

We have had a great term, and it has flown past! 

On Wednesday we started off by heading to the Yarra youth centre where the students finished off their journals and reminisced on the activities. We all had some great chats about everything we had completed and all that they accomplished. We also began their speech writing for our graduation the next day! The students all picked an activity and a character strength they displayed through this activity. It was amazing hearing all of the reflections from throughout the term and to look at how far they had come! After this we headed to the Collingwood English language school to donate 2 recently restored bikes for two recently arrived students! Our students went through the ABCDDE of bike safety and explained all the components of the bikes and began a riding lesson! They taught the students how to safely break and how to change gears and everything else they would need to know about their new bikes! The students did amazingly on this community project and gave two very deserving students some great bikes to use! 

On Thursday we had our operation Newstart graduation!! It was such an amazing day, and the students all delivered their speeches fantastically! It was great to watch the end of term video and be able to see everything they had completed and achieved throughout the term! It was an amazing turnout for the graduation with parents, teachers and service providers all showing up to show their support for the students on this huge achievement! After receiving certificates and finishing up the graduation everyone stuck around for a chat and some food, It was an incredible day to celebrate all the effort and work the students have put in everyday this term!! 

And to finish up the week on Friday we had our last boxing lesson with Sal whereas usual the students gave their best efforts and had a great session! We did some drills, and the students had the opportunity to take the lead of which exercises they would do and practise their leadership! Some of the students again practised their skills in the ring with Sal and it was great to see how much everyone had learnt over the term! 

After boxing we headed to docklands to go ice skating for a final celebration activity, it was very fun to all learn how to ice skate with help from our instructor! We finished our lesson and had some free time to skate around, chat and grab something to eat. It was a great way to end the term! 

For our last student interview, we spoke to Frankie and Ruby! 

Frankie’s favourite part of this week was boxing and ice skating because it was fun and the bacon and egg roll at ice skating. She found speeches the most challenging as she felt she didn’t prepare enough, and she was worried her speech wasn’t good. And Frankie is going to miss the people and the new experiences each day the most. 

Ruby’s favourite part of this week was graduation and finishing the program. She found ice skating the most challenging because it was cold and her feet hurt. And Ruby is going to miss the bus and the people on the program. 

Thanks again to everyone for a great term!