About the Trust
What we do
The Bay of Plenty Youth Development Trust (BOPYDT) was established in November 2017 to improve the lives of young people in the Tauranga area by delivering inspiring programmes built on our core values:
- To help and support the educational, social and physical development of BOP youth;
- To provide support and funding for programmes that provide educational, social and physical development;
- To provide support for BOP youth who are socially disadvantaged and/or from dysfunctional families;
- To provide facilities and other appropriate assistance to BOP youth;
- To foster and encourage interests enabling youth to improve self-esteem and behaviour.
With our ongoing success and positive reputation, our programmes rapidly grew and diversified. We now have five programmes, as well as sharing our premises with:
- Imagine Believe Achieve
- Tauranga Boxing Academy
- Aiga
- Ki Tai
- Te Hono
As we grew, we moved to a much-needed larger location in 2022. Purposely refurbished and fitted to a high specification through generous support from funders, Youth Central – Te Puna o Taiohi (The Spring of Youth) is a strategic youth hub for the young people of Tauranga. In our spacious 1,050m² building we deliver our values based fitness programmes which help youth to:
- Learn discipline and get physically and mentally fit;
- Understand and learn core values;
- Develop leadership capability and self-confidence through access to positive role models and mentors.
Whilst the gym is a major influencer for encouraging change, we invite our young people to participate in activities outside the gym engaging positively with our wider community.
Values
Manaakitanga (Kindness)
Being kind, generous and compassionate
Manawaroa (Resilience)
Being able to cope with hard times
Whakaute (Respect)
Having a positive attitude towards someone or something
Whakapono (Trust)
Being truthful, honest and showing integrity
Takohanga (Responsibility)
Being accountable for your actions
How we do it
An essential feature in our approach is the delivery of integrated and ongoing programmes, alongside post-pastoral support to help youth in their life journey. We’ve found this ongoing guidance reinforces the taught lessons and improves the likelihood of long-term positive outcomes. We also leverage our strong governance model and Trustees for their chosen for their professional skills, networks in the community and a passion to see our local youth succeed.
We strongly believe in the power of collaboration and set up the Piritahi Youth Collective. This collective comprises of groups, who work with at-risk youth in the Bay of Plenty, getting together monthly to discuss new opportunities and developing shared initiatives.
We see huge opportunities to continue working with other service providers and utilising our Youth Central facility to operate as a strategic and collaborative youth hub. This has the potential to shift the way youth service providers and funders work together to staircase individual youth towards successful outcomes. We believe this will provide strong community benefits and opportunities for transformative change.
