National Youth Lived Experience Reference Group

At the Brain and Mind Centre, in the Youth Mental Health and Technology team, we believe that involving young people with lived experience of mental health concerns in our research is critically important. Young people with lived experience need a voice at every stage and phase of the research process.

We’re delighted to announce today the implementation of the National ‘Right care, first time, where you live’ Youth Lived Experience Reference Group. The goal of this reference group is to embed lived experience in every aspect and phase of the Program to ensure that we achieve our objectives and to ensure that the Program is sustainable in the long term.  

The purpose of the National Youth Lived Experience Reference Group is to:

  1. Provide youth lived experience expertise across all phases of the Program including:

    - Workshop design to ensure accessibility for young people with lived experience.
    - Advising on ensuring accessibility of the program for young people with lived experience (Evaluation, modelling, participatory action research, etc)
    - Advising on lived experience to support questions within local modelling processes that can’t be explained locally.

  2. Be a key link between and across ‘Right care, first time where you live’ Program sites to share learnings for implementation and sustainability by sharing and exploring learnings from each site. 
     

  3. Provide strategic advice to ensure that the ‘Right care, first time where you live’ Program will deliver relevant, informed, and accessible youth-focused content. This includes the production and development of youth-focused communications material.

The group will be comprised of young people (16-30) who have lived experience of a mental health concern, who have been involved with the regional implementation of the ‘Right care, first time, where you live’ Program at one of the eight Program sites. Two young people from each Program site will be selected to join the reference group.  The process for appointing members will be through expressions of interest from the young people who have been involved with the implementation of the Program at each site.  Individuals who have demonstrated an interest in collaborating with researchers to refine and develop the Program will be identified and asked to participate. 

From the first Program implementation site in the ACT we are delighted to announce that Josephine Brogden and Elian Au have been appointed as the first members of the National ‘Right care, first time, where you live’ Youth Lived Experience Reference Group. 

 

Josephine Brogden has been involved with youth lived experience advocacy and leadership on the ‘Right care, first time, where you live’ Program implementation in the ACT. She supported the local consortium to shape the youth lived experience engagement and accessibility of the program. In 2022 she was awarded the ACT Mental Health Month Award for Leadership in Lived Experience and the ACT Youth Coalition’s YOGIE award for Outstanding Contribution to Young People for her work on the ‘Right care, firs time, where you live program’ and also for her work with other local advisory groups. 

 

Elian Au was an integral member of the ‘Right care, first time, where you live’ ACT Youth Reference Group. He has been a strong advocate for LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC mental health throughout the Program’s systems modelling workshops and additional youth engagement processes. Elian brings a vast knowledge of the mental health sector in the ACT and experience in other lived experience/ youth advisor roles on other local projects.

Emily Selmon