This project was created after consultation with a range of youth groups. Unemployment post-COVID-19 was identified as a major issue affecting young people in Whyalla.  With several lacking the means to engage in further training needed and gaining the experiences needed for employment.

The Starship Enterprise aims to create a space that is designed and run by young people providing them with an opportunity to experiment with entrepreneurship whilst gaining valuable work and life skills, solidifying and expanding their existing social networks, and making a little profit along the way.

The project utilises an existing youth space with a commercial kitchen to create a Cafe environment once a week for four months. The Cafe will be led by young people. The program will also provide training for a variety of directed skill development for 10 young people including:

• Life skills training
• Responsible service of alcohol training
• Youth mental health training
• Small business experience training
• Barista training.

Project achievements

STARSHIP ENTERPRISE- wow what a journey!

Ten young people, 4 committed coordinators and many hands-on supporters has made this journey totally amazing! This project has achieved amazing outcomes for our 1 Captain and 9 co-pilots, in training, relationship building, confidence, and general life skill and personal development. Friendships have been made, relationships built, this program has encouraged this group of vulnerable youth to engage in as many opportunities possible in four months.

We know this program has been valuable to our crew as they tell us this all the time. This group of young people have been isolated, and since they have left high school most of the group have not taken part in any formalised training or community leadership opportunities. Their clinicians have supported the group to step out of their comfort zones by continually challenge them, there have been bumps along the way but the participants have turned up week after week and are now questioning “What happens next for us?” We are ready to join the world! We are so proud of how far this group has come and it is not over yet!

The cohort often was chosen by headspace clinicians & program coordinators. These ten young people we believe deserve a chance to try something new. Quite a few of our group of ten have lived experiences of trauma, social disconnection & mental health concerns, so this program was so far out of their comfort zone. We also had the advantage of the extra wrap-around support from the headspace team within the project to assist these young people.

In the process of developing this program, we consulted with three local focus groups, headspace Youth Reference Group, Whyalla Youth Advisory Committee & D'faces of Youth Arts members, from these conversations we sought direction as to how we could support the youth demographic through recovery from COVID19. Our program was created in total consultation with our focus groups.  

The program direction was also fashioned to be fluid, so our participants could in a way choose their own adventure, with a mixture of structured training, team building and opportunities chosen by the group, this is actually how the four-month program panned out.

Project outcomes

This project has seen our outcomes blown out of the water, we started with ten participants, and we completed the program with all ten, due to the vulnerability of our participants we were unsure of how the program would end. Our cohort of young people has many barriers in their lives including trauma, isolation, low resilience, and poor mental wellbeing. This program has given them something to get out of bed for, they have been able to connect with ten like-minded people with similar mental health concerns and barriers. COVID 19 has made it harder for our most vulnerable people to connect.  

All of our certificated training courses were completed by participants, with all course providers commenting on the commitment of the young people involved, this led to course providers offering other opportunities to our group, eg: experiences in forklift, skid steer and tours of workplaces.

Customers at our weekly enterprising café were surveyed for customer service satisfaction around food quality, service and value for money, most weeks saw our crew receive generous tips at the Flying Saucer Café!  

We contracted two paid videographers to capture the outcomes and progress of Starship Enterprise (as per our grant funding) one Starship Participant and one local youth videographer, through these images you can see the confidence of the group grow, and also some feedback from their families and program leaders.


We used several approaches to evaluate this program: Clinicians gave de-identified feedback, family members of our young people gave general feedback while attending the cafe', and we obtained direct feedback from the participants.

Feedback from headspace clinicians:  

• I have found the group to be incredibly empowering and have noticed significant improvements for many of our young people. Most of all, our young people are building a productive identity and for many, this has never been something they have seen as achievable.
• Many of the young people were not motivated, not leaving their homes and were experiencing severe social anxiety. For these young people, they have been able to build social skills, connect with the world and people around them, develop meaningful friendships, and most importantly have done so whilst also experiencing a sense of mastery over their lives. This program has supported outcomes that I truly believe would not have been possible through mainstream job network providers.
• I have noticed an improvement in the well-being and social skills of my young people attending Starship.
• Some have felt that this has helped with them stepping out of their comfort zones and participating in activities they never would usually do with ease.
• This group of young people have developed friendships and confidence during this program.
• They have gained ownership of the program and developed a sense of responsibility and pride.
• They have felt proud of their work at the Café and feel a sense of belonging and contribution.
• The Starship program has been invaluable for those who participated and their family and community. I have known many of the young people who joined starship, for 12+ months in a professional capacity through headspace. Most of the participants were initially reluctant to participate, having not engaged in formal education or employment in some years, if at all. Many participants had negative experiences through their schooling journey and had been involved with job providers with limited success.
• During the program I noticed huge individual growth in every young person, some of them believing in themselves and their abilities for the first time. The facilitators were able to create an environment where participants felt comfortable and safe to step beyond their comfort zone and motivated them to want to build upon their existing skills and interests. The feedback from the young people included that they felt a sense of purpose and enjoyed contributing, their days had meaning, they were eager to participate and contribute to the team, program and community.
• The participants seemed to thrive, working through challenges such as low self-worth, mental health issues, social isolation and coming from backgrounds that had afforded limited opportunities. Participants discussed their time in Starship with passion and enthusiasm, provided strong commitment to the program, found routine, productiveness and connection with others after a prolonged time of feeling directionless. They spoke about wanting to continue to contribute to their own development and to the community, through further study, volunteering or finding employment.
• The program was able to provide an opportunity for these young people to stretch their abilities and provide them with confidence for what was possible in their futures.
• I believe the Starship program has been a huge turning point in the lives of the young people who were lucky enough to be a part of the program.

Feedback from families attending the Friday night café:

• I have struggled to get my young person to get out of bed for any reason, yet they are happy to get up and get ready for Starship every week, what can be done at the end of the program to maintain this momentum?
• My daughter has struggled to fit in, this group of young people are so kind and giving, it shows my daughter that there is a place in the world for them.

Feedback from the participants;

• I am not sure what I will do when Starship ends, I am feeling quite anxious about this.
• Do you think I could try getting work experience at the place we did the Barista training?
• Will you be a reference for me on my resume?
• I have formed great friendships as part of this program, everyone is so kind.

Other outcomes:

Long term

We are excited to announce that the program participants will remain connected through headspace in a program which has the potential to be called Jobspace, where they will meet once a fortnight with a Vocational Worker and will continue to work towards extending their existing skills, confidence and employment opportunities. This group will also act as mentors to other young people in similar circumstances.  

Members of this group have gone on to join other community organisations and support groups, such as the Whyalla Show Society, headspace GASP Group (Gender & Sexuality Pride), Youth Advisory Groups, some participants are earmarked for work placement later in the year. Another has been engaged by D'faces (local youth arts organisation and partner) to create artwork for their use, redesign their Kanga Gym logo and participate in an arts project.

One member will join the Whyalla Council Youth Advisory committee, all members have a greater understanding of what a Council does, civic pride and feel much more comfortable entering a Council building, as the intimidation factor has been reduced. Having young people in the Council building has had a two-fold effect, Whyalla Council staff are engaging with more young people than they have in the past due to an increased young people traffic in the building.  

One participant has an opportunity to gain work experience which may lead to employment at our local theatre.

Ongoing learning and collaborations

We think this project was so successful due to the wrap-around nature of the supports put in place. All participants have been supported by clinicians and a Vocational Worker through headspace. We feel this model is quite sustainable, if the opportunity for funding arose again, the only difference we would include, would be to factor in the wages of an overall coordinator

We think this program was almost perfect, the only addition we would suggest is the ability to assist our cohort to go through the process of obtaining their learners and license, as this is seen as a major barrier to employment locally. We did investigate this opportunity in the early stages of consultation but all of our driver education trainers just could not commit to this addition to the program, as they were still coping with the backlog of testing and driving lessons due to COVID shutting everything down.

Council staff have had an opportunity to engage with young people who are involved in the project as they are quite often in the building, staff have also had the chance to learn about the LGBTIQA+ community from our Starship crew.  

The Starship crew have had the chance to engage in two council arts project, project 1- involved adding a mural to the local skate bowl, this program was driven by the Youth Development Officer and Council's Arts and Cultural Officer, three Starship crew members took part in this project.  

Project 2- is the creation of a tiny library, one of our participants is particularly artistic and has created all of our graphic designs, mascots, menus, has been instrumental in designing and producing the tiny library for Council. There is a commitment from D'faces to engage this artist in further activities including judging the youth art at the Whyalla Show, creation of some marketing materials (paid work) and participating in further visual arts projects

The project has strengthened the relationship between headspace and Council, with staff of these two organisations working closely together to deliver the best outcomes for the young people involved in the program. D'faces of Youth Art have also been a major player in this program, and some of the Starship crew have gained paid design work from D'faces, which included designing colouring in books for KANGA Gym birthday party packs, and sticker designs.

Training providers who've been engaged to deliver the formalised side training to our crew have gone out of their way to support this group with adaptable training delivery, some of our crew have struggled to sit in a classroom situation all day, as they have not undertaken any structured training since high school.

One of our local cafe's -Heidi's volunteered their Barista, Shannon who also has lived experience of trauma to undertake coffee making skills for the crew has also offered the opportunity of work experience at the café, two of our crew will take up this offer later in the year.

Project images