Chance meeting opens way to a bright future

Youth transition services have made the difference for Samara Biddle. Photo / Sarah Ivey

Samara Biddle had never heard of youth transition services until she ran into "youth coach" Crystal Keung at her local Work and Income office.

Ms Biddle, 20, finished year 13 at Kawerau College in the Bay of Plenty in 2008 but left with what Ms Keung calls "minimal school qualifications".

"She excelled in Maori and that was pretty much it."

Unfortunately that wasn't much use in Australia, where she went to try her luck.

"I couldn't get a job because that's when the recession started.

"There were no jobs that I was qualified for."

She found some part-time work, but after eight months she came home to stay with her sister in Otara.

She met Ms Keung when she attended a Work and Income seminar for unemployed youth in June last year.

"She asked me what I was applying for," Ms Biddle says.

"I was applying for a course at MIT [Manukau Institute of Technology]. She told me they paid for the exact same course."

First she did a six-month foundation course at Solomon Group in Manurewa, then stepped up to the MIT course in the first half of this year. It wasn't smooth sailing.

Ms Keung and her colleagues kept in touch.

"They helped me if I didn't have my stuff in [in time]. They'd get my time pushed back," Ms Biddle says.

Ms Keung had to organise a meeting with Ms Biddle and her tutor when her attendance slipped.

"We were able to overcome that by sitting down and reviewing her plan and saying, 'These are the consequences - if you want to get to this goal this is what you need to do.'

"Her ultimate goal was to get into tertiary and she knew that."

Ms Biddle is now working fulltime at a Nando's fast-food outlet and hopes to enrol in a three-year teaching degree at MIT next year.