See Sydney city like never before.

Youthworks City Mission takes you to a place like no other. Incorporating both education and adventure, this eye opening experience is perfect for groups looking to understand the lives of some of Sydney’s most disadvantaged.

The City Mission program is highly customisable and Youthworks partners with a number of charities and organisations that work with Sydney’s less fortunate.

We also understand that the gravity of the issues explored can weigh quite heavily on students, so our program also includes activities and challenges to help students have fun and process what is being learned.

On top of all this students will be challenged with real life skill challenges. The program is highly self-led encouraging students to be responsible for their own decisions. Over the course of the program students are actively in charge of activities such as budgeting food money for their group of peers, navigating the city and making sure they arrive at appointments on time and cooking for one another. 

“Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.” - Isaiah 1:17

Activities with a social justice focus:

A three day program will have the time for possibly four of the below activities, depending on what is selected. 

• Salvation Army Workshop – A session to think through youth homelessness

• Oz Harvest Challenge – A challenge to support the work that Oz Harvest do and to think through food waste. 

• The Big Issue Session – A session learning about The Big Issue magazine and how it impacts the lives of people in the program.

• The Big Issue Challenge – A challenge to meet people selling The Big Issue magazine and have conversations with these people learning about what life is like for them whilst buying a copy of the magazine from them. 

• Hamper Challenge – Research an organisation and design and purchase a hamper that will help people in need.

• Rough Edges Urban Walk – Meet someone who has experienced homelessness and go for a walk around Kings Cross with this person hearing about life from their perspective. 

• Our Big Kitchen – Head to OBK and get involved in cooking meals for the homeless. Students will sit under the direction of the chefs and get a very hands on experience of helping people in need. 

• Sleeping Rough experience – We’ve started running these in partnership with St John’s Darlinghurst who also run the Rough Edges Urban Walk. Students spend 24 hours experiencing what it is like to be homeless, sleeping overnight on cardboard in the gated grounds of St John’s Darlinghurst and doing the Rough Edges Urban Walk. 

Activities for recreation:

There are a lot of issues the students are confronted by within the program. We recognise it is important to provide some activities where the students have a break from the serious side of the program and have some fun. This can help them as they process the things they are seeing and hearing. We often head to the Wild Ropes course at Taronga Zoo and do bike riding around the Domain. We would suggest a three day program only has time for one of these activities. 

Evening Activity Options

• The Sleeping Rough experience at Darlinghurst 

• Tall Ship dinner cruise

• MasterChef dinner challenge and outdoor cinema / games night

• Chinatown dinner challenge and games in the park at Darling Harbour 

Accommodation on Cockatoo Island