Big Homelessness Ideas Challenge

Last Friday, one representative from each Year 8 House Group had the opportunity to attend the Brisbane Big Ideas Challenge, organised by Future Anything. The aim of the challenge was to empower young people to ideate, prototype and pitch innovative solutions for those experiencing homelessness and hardship.

We began the day by meeting with students from the 12 schools who were participating. Shortly afterward, we were privileged to listen to a presentation from one of the co-founders of Orange Sky Australia, Lucas Patchett. Listening to Lucas’ motivations was inspiring. He opened our eyes to the fact that homelessness comes in many forms and isn’t exclusive to one group of society. It’s easy to forget, but behind every cardboard sign, there is an untold story.

Full of vigour and motivation after his presentation, we soon formed groups with peers from other schools who shared similar passions. After several hours of intense ideation, finessing our solutions, and identifying the root causes of our chosen issue, we were finally ready to present. We broke into groups to pitch our homelessness solutions to a panel of judges who had the tough job of choosing just one winner from each semi-final to proceed to the grand finale. Two BGGS girls—Sofia Shirley (8M) and Leah Huang (8W) both made it through with their impressive ideas of a ‘Walk and Talk’ counselling and dog walking service and a make-a-wish style sponsorship program to help those struggling to achieve their dreams.

All nine of us thoroughly enjoyed the experience and are grateful to Ms Lynne Mungomery and Ms Alice Dabelstein for attending with us on the day and allowing us to partake in such an insightful opportunity. We’re walking away more worldly than we were before.

Zara Beveridge (8G)