Four Year 8 students were fortunate enough to see inspirational speaker, Nedd Brockman, present at a special lunch highlighting the issue of homelessness. As part of their Transdisciplinary Unit (TDU), Year 8 students have been learning about homelessness, so the presentation was particularly relevant and applicable to their studies.
The presentation deepened the students' understanding of the complexity of homelessness. In class, a TDU approach allows students to view a single issue through multiple lenses, examining the economics of affordable housing, the psychology of social isolation and the power of persuasive communication. Nedd Brockman’s firsthand accounts of meeting people on the streets vividly illustrated these concepts, shifting the students' perspective from viewing homelessness as an abstract statistics-driven problem to recognising it as a deeply human crisis requiring urgent empathy and structural support.
Here is a reflection from one of the students, Ollie Sheringham, on what they took away from this thought-provoking event:
On Wednesday the 27th of May, I was one of four SHC Year 8 students who went to GMHBA stadium for the Conversations That Matter with Nedd Brockmann lunch. There were 4 guest speakers; Nedd Brockmann, who raised $2.5 million to end homelessness by running from Perth to Bondi in just 46 days, Amy Hunter, the chair of the Outpost, Josephine Taylor, the director of Youth Housing and South West services at Meli, and Jessie Moore, a 21-year old who has experienced 2 years of homelessness.
We learnt that homelessness in Geelong is rising 10x faster than the Australian average. Nedd was very inspiring to hear from - he told us that to get uncomfortable you need to do things out of your comfort zone and if you set a goal there should be 'no way out'. If you are going to say you're going to do it, you have to do it. He told us the reason he started was because when he went for his runs, the only people who would smile at him were the people rough sleeping. He realised that they weren't being acknowledged and that they are just people like us.
Overall, we learnt that homelessness is a big issue in Geelong, and we can all help by supporting local social enterprises and rethinking our stereotypes.
