Hey John,
Our kids are in trouble.
Youth crime is up all over Australia and communities are demanding action. Politicians are talking tough on crime and debate across Australia is raging over everything from social media age restrictions to tougher bail laws.
Meanwhile, youth justice advocates point to a lack of family stability with too many kids growing up with violence as the norm.
It’s not an easy fix, but locking kids up is not the answer, it just makes them better criminals. It does nothing to break the cycle!
I’m not saying that kids who commit crimes shouldn’t be held to account, of course they should, but there are other options that work, and they need to be on the table.
One of them is the Veteran Mentors Junior Leadership Program founded in 2016 by Matt French, an Afghanistan Veteran and his two great mates Glenn and Troy.
Matt had a rugged childhood himself. He spent his early years living with domestic violence and doing everything he could to protect and help his mum.
His teenage years were messy too – but Matt got it together and joined the Army when he was 25.
After his service Matt wondered if the army structure and discipline, that worked so well for him, would help other kids like him.
In 2016 Matt – or Frenchy - as the kids call him, started to plan and in 2017 Veteran Mentors was born.
The Veteran Mentor programs are for kids aged 12-17, for children who are showing poor behaviours, low self-esteem, aggression, lack of respect, anxiety, depression, self-mutilation and tech addiction. A lot of these kids have been in the mainstream mental health system for years with zero results.
Their schools and their teachers can’t control them, and their parents are at their wits end.
In January this year I joined the Veteran Mentor junior leadership program in Kangaroo Valley, and I saw the transformation myself.
It’s a nine-day course and it’s not just about military discipline. The programs include group therapy, family therapy, active outdoor challenges, healthy eating, conflict resolution and leadership lessons.
Once the kids have completed the program, they are assigned a veteran mentor who stays in touch with their mentee for two years.
This program puts these kids back on the right path and they are getting amazing results. They have an 80% success rate and they have thousands of families on the waiting list.
One day in the middle of the camp, a mother and daughter dropped in to thank Matt. The young woman had re-engaged with her school studies, and as her mother told me “I got my daughter back”. There was lots of tears and hugs, from me too!
Grateful past parents give large donations so that low-income kids can take part, the program is $6000 per child, and when you look at how much it costs to keep a kid in detention, it’s cheap at the price.
This program won’t work for every child, but they work for many.
State and Federal Governments need to look at programs like Veteran Mentors it won’t work for all kids or families but it’s a hell of a lot better than locking them up.
