Supporting youth mental health with Five Ways to Wellbeing

For eight weeks over summer, Vaka Tautua has played host to several University of Otago students as part of the POPO internship programme. POPO, which stands for the Pacific Opportunities Programme at Otago, aims to increase the number of Pacific students in health related fields in Aotearoa.

Genevieve Tuisamoa, studying towards a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree, and Margaret Hakai, majoring in Pacific Health for a Bachelor of Health Sciences, were embedded in Vaka Tautua’s Ola Fiafia Mental Health Team in Auckland.

With help from Community Support Worker, Mele Mafi, the Samoan interns put together a creative programme for young Pacific people to support their mental health.

*Five Ways to Wellbeing students and teachers*

The two-day workshop was aimed at Pacific teenagers and was based on the Five Ways to Wellbeing promoted by the Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand.

Margaret, Genevieve, and Mele designed interactive sessions utilising art, music, movement, and talanoa to deliver tools in a fun and informative way for the twelve teens who took part in January.

They offered techniques for self-care, self-reflection, and mindfulness, and encouraged the participants to learn how to recognise the signs of stress in themselves and others.

With their time at Vaka Tautua coming to an end, it was a great achievement for Genevieve and Margaret to successfully execute such an ambitious project for Vaka Tautua’s Ora’anga mental health service.

In their final presentation for the internship, Genevieve spoke about the invaluable opportunity the internship gave for working with Pacific mental health service users face-to-face and the importance of building rapport.

Margaret said, “The internship was a really good experience for me because it was closely aligned to what I want to do in the future… working with Pacific communities, empowering people to champion their own health.”

Vaka Tautua is proud to support the POPO internship programme, giving students an opportunity to gain experience working within a Pacific health organisation in New Zealand.