Sunshine Coast charity puts young people behind the camera to back Australia-first mental health truck
Rise & Thrive Co.
- Sunshine Coast youth mental health charity Rise & Thrive Co. is producing a music video, made by young creatives, to support the launch of Checkpoint — set to be Australia's first dedicated youth mental health outreach truck.
- Checkpoint will deliver trauma-informed support directly to schools, regional towns and communities at no cost to young people, with no referral or waitlist required.
- The campaign deliberately involves young people in front of and behind the camera, with student filmmaker Oisin Bourke directing and young crew members gaining real production experience as part of the charity's focus on creating job pathways.
- The music video format was chosen to reach two distinct audiences simultaneously — young people in crisis and potential business supporters — and to tell the charity's story ethically, given child safety obligations prevent Rise & Thrive Co. from photographing or identifying any of the young people it works with.
- Rise & Thrive Co., which is a recognised Proven Provider of safe mental health programmes in Queensland, is seeking sponsors to cover production costs, with all donations over $2 tax deductible through its DGR status.
A Sunshine Coast youth mental health charity is taking a different approach to its next campaign, commissioning a music video made by young creatives to build support for what will be Australia's first dedicated youth mental health outreach truck.
Janelle Parsons founded Rise & Thrive Co. after her own childhood in the state system, and has spent the past six years building trauma-informed programs for adolescents as a registered counsellor. She said involving young people in the campaign mattered as much to her as the campaign itself.
“Everything we do comes back to young people having a say. This is no different, they are in the conversation and they are in the making of it,” Ms Parsons said.
“A young filmmaker gets the credit and the body of work, and young crew get experience on a real production. That is a job pathway, and creating those is the whole reason we exist.
“If we don't support our youth, what does tomorrow look like?”
Rise & Thrive Co. supported 315 young people across Queensland schools and communities in 2025. Of those, 94 per cent showed improved emotional regulation, 85 per cent reported increased confidence, and schools recorded a 78 per cent reduction in suspensions among participants. The charity now works with 595 adolescents, with engagement continuing across a three-month period rather than a single session, and is a recognised Proven Provider of safe mental health programs in Queensland.
The campaign is being built to support Checkpoint, which will be Australia's first dedicated youth mental health outreach truck. It will take trauma-informed support directly to schools, regional towns and communities with no referral, no waitlist and no cost to young people. Rise & Thrive Co. wants it on the road by Christmas.
The music video will be directed by Sunshine Coast filmmaker Oisin Bourke, a student ambassador with the Screen Collective, who has volunteered his time. It will be built around a song gifted to the charity by recording artist Yorkshire Gypsy, which follows a young person standing on a street corner in the middle of the night with nowhere to go, set against a woman who came through the same circumstances and now works with young people facing them. The lyrics draw on Ms Parsons’ own history.
Ms Parsons said the format was chosen to do two jobs at once.
"We need to reach the kid who has decided nobody is coming, and we need to reach the business owner who can help us get to them. Those are two completely different audiences, and three minutes of music and visuals speaks to both of them at the same time.
“We also can't put faces to the work we do. For child safety and ethical reasons we cannot photograph or identify a single young person we work with, so the usual case studies and portraits a campaign leans on are not available to us. The story still needs to be told.”
Mr Bourke said the film would challenge assumptions about the young people it depicts.
“There is a narrative out there about kids being written off as the bad ones, and very little curiosity about why they are behaving that way.
“Most of them are coming out of situations no adult would cope with. We are showing a slice of that life honestly and we are keeping it raw. It should look the way teenagers actually look when they walk down the street,” he said.
Production is expected to take three to four months around a two-day shoot, with the process documented and released as the project develops. Rise & Thrive Co. is seeking sponsors to cover production costs, which sit outside its program and outreach budgets. All donations over $2 are tax deductible through the organisation's DGR status.
To donate, visit https://riseandthriveco.org.au/donate/
About us:
Rise & Thrive Co. is a Queensland-based, ACNC-registered youth mental health charity delivering trauma-informed early intervention programs across schools and communities. Programs include No Filters Needed, Bounce Back and Better Solutions, as well as the forthcoming Checkpoint mobile outreach initiative. Rise & Thrive Co. is a recognised Proven Provider of safe mental health programs in Queensland. www.riseandthriveco.org.au
Contact details:
Millana Ayache
0499072922
