Coming from two very different backgrounds, the 2018 Youth Awards ambassadors Macaylah Johnson and Sam Rizzo are excited to share the achievements of Ballarat’s young people with a wider audience.
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Seventeen-year-old Buninyong wheelchair athlete Sam showed incredible grit and maturity in his sporting endeavors this year, finishing sixth in men’s T54 1500 metres at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.
As a proud young Wadawurrung woman, Macaylah has been an incredible ambassador for her community, encouraging her friends and schoolmates to ask her about her culture. She has also passionately shared the history of her family’s female line, connecting with the NAIDOC Week theme of ‘Because of Her, We Can’.
She said there was a “negative portrayal” of young people in media and in broad public opinion, with the city needing to recognise “how much good is going on and how much young people are doing and giving back to the community”.
READ MORE Macaylah shares her story
“Volunteering your time is a really rewarding experience, and you learn so much from that … [the awards] are a good self-esteem boost for young people and encourages them to keep going and doing the right thing.”
Sam said while improving as an athlete, “progressing and getting better”, the acknowledgement of his hard work had been “fundamental” to his career.
“There’s some amazing, talented young people here that through their own passions like sport, art or public speaking are just rising up and doing what they love to do,” he said. “They should definitely get signed up for the awards. There’s no harm in putting your name down and havign a crack."
Nominations for City of Ballarat’s Youth Awards will close at 5pm on August 24. Categories will recognise young people for their contributions to entrepreneurship, STEM, sport, arts and volunteering.
The Youth Awards will be presented at a ceremony at the Wendouree Centre of Performing Arts on October 12. For more information or to lodge a nomination, go to youthawards.ballarat.vic.gov.au.