GoodYarn Community Pilot Gears Up For Growth

Joint media release from the Head Light Trust and the Southern Wellbeing Trust

An innovative peer-delivered community mental health programme aimed at empowering people to stay well is gearing up to grow after being successfully piloted in the Queenstown Lakes District.

Since May 2021, the ‘GoodYarn Community' programme has brought together over 250 locals from different community sectors to talk about mental health and arm themselves with more knowledge, strategies and skills to help them stay mentally well and support others who are struggling.

Designed and delivered by the Queenstown-based Southern Wellbeing Trust, in partnership with the Good Programmes Trust (GPT), the objective of the pilot was to increase mental health knowledge and skills across the district, prioritising those who were most vulnerable, to help combat the widespread mental health effects of COVID-19 and build resilience.

The pilot was based on the GPT’s award-winning, evidence-based GoodYarn mental health education programme, which has been successfully delivered to large workplaces and rural communities since 2007. The pilot was designed with input from local agencies, and the content adapted to suit individuals, community leaders, cultural groups, new and expectant parents, and small businesses.

The success of the pilot is largely credited to the use of peer facilitators - community members with relevant lived experience or skills who can relate closely to the group they’re working with and deliver the information in a language, time and place that suits them. This community-led approach has proven particularly successful with traditionally hard-to-reach groups and diverse cultures and has received widespread endorsement and support from local organisations and trusts.

With the pilot ending on 30 June 2022, a new charitable entity – the Head Light Trust – has been formed to focus on refining the GoodYarn Community programme so that it can be scaled up and rolled out to empower more communities to support their mental wellbeing.

Anna Dorsey, co-founder of the Southern Wellbeing Trust, is the new Chief Executive of Head Light and will lead its team of operations staff and community-based GoodYarn facilitators. She will exit the Southern Wellbeing Trust and co-founder Dr Tim Rigg will remain as its Director, continuing his important work of researching and building other innovative and community-led approaches to support mental health and wellbeing.

Anna says her team is relishing the challenge of developing GoodYarn into a sustainable mental health education programme that other towns and communities can benefit from.

“The mental health impacts of COVID-19 have been tough and will continue for some time yet. But we’re seeing firsthand the tangible benefits GoodYarn Community is bringing – it’s creating a ripple effect of mental health education across our communities and we want to help share it more widely,” she explains.

Anna notes that as word spreads, they’re seeing more demand for the programme, with some local community organisations now looking to embed the workshop into their own training schedule for volunteers and members, “which is fantastic.”

“This programme is all about prevention, early intervention and staying well. We can’t think of a better outcome than as many New Zealanders as possible having the skills and confidence to shine a light on mental health and be able to help themselves and those around them who are struggling,” she said.

Data shows that the workshops have achieved consistently high quality learning outcomes, with 97% of participants stating that the workshops have increased their knowledge of mental health and wellbeing.

But it’s the qualitative data that has really moved Anna and her team.

“Hearing stories from so many of our participants about how it’s helped them personally and helped them to talk with people around them who are having a tough time, has only strengthened our conviction to make this programme available to as many people as possible,” said Anna.

“Feedback shows that in just one three-hour workshop, people come away with better insights into mental health, their own behaviour and some coping strategies for themselves and ways to support their whānau, friends, neighbours, and colleagues.

“Our goal is to keep building on this successful foundation and the learnings we’ve gained, and grow GoodYarn Community into a sustainable programme that can support community mental wellbeing on a much larger scale.”

While the Head Light Trust team will continue to host GoodYarn workshops, it will also be building up its organisational structure and governance, including developing a funding strategy that supports a sustainable business model and secures appropriate funding.

The Head Light team will continue to work with Ember Innovations*, a specialist entity that supports entrepreneurial initiatives to improve the mental health and mental wellbeing of people in Aotearoa.

To find out more about GoodYarn Workshops and the Head Light Trust, visit www.mentalhealthworkshops.org.nz.

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