Become a Live4Life community
Empower your local area with a long-term, sustainable community youth mental health model.
Four Stages of the Live4Life model
Live4Life supports communities intensively through FOUR STAGES:
Live4Life is not a quick fix. It is a long-term prevention approach and works in conjunction with other suicide prevention strategies, as outlined in the Black Dog Institute’s LifeSpan model. The four stages have been carefully developed to ensure communities have the assistance, resources, structures and expertise to implement the Live4Life model and support young people’s mental health and wellbeing long into the future!
Live4Life is a whole-of-community model designed specifically to improve youth mental health and reduce suicide in rural and regional areas.
The Live4Life model is independently implemented by rural and regional communities, with guidance and support from the Live4Life organisation.
The organisation works with government, philanthropy, corporate partners and donors to enable a small team of Advisers, Communications, Fundraising, Policy and Research specialists to work collaboratively with communities and empower you to implement the Live4Life model successfully.
Experience has shown it takes up to five years to fully embed the Live4Life model in a community. This allows time to build a strong foundation and relationships, as well as to learn from the early years. All stages are undertaken in consultation with Live4Life.
Live4Life comes to communities when invited. This usually occurs because a community has identified a need for youth mental health support and has seen in Live4Life an approach that suits their needs.
If you would like more information on becoming a Live4Life community, please send an enquiry to bridie.johnstone@live4life.org.au
Stage 1: Pre-activating & Expression of Interest
If your community has identified a need for youth mental health support and sees in Live4Life an approach that suits your needs, staff from Live4Life will work with you to establish your interest and your community’s capacity and readiness to implement the Live4Life model.
During this stage, Live4LIfe staff will:
Meet multiple times with community partners, schools and other interested parties
Deliver presentations to clearly lay out how the Live4Life model works and what is needed to establish it securely
Help you develop an achievable budget
Help you identify an organisation to act as Lead Agency (usually local government, local health provider, community organisation, or school)
Work with you to complete a formal Expression of Interest application and submit it for review
Our investment in this stage is delivered at no cost to your community.
The Pre-activating & Expression of Interest stage takes up to 12 months to 18 months to complete.
Stage 2: Activating
Once your Expression of Interest is confirmed, Live4Life will sign an Agreement with the Lead Agency identified through the EoI application process. Your community is now a Member Community of Live4Life and ready to commence Activating.
During this stage, with the help of Live4Life staff, you will:
Convene interested partners (including schools) for an Activation Workshop
Establish a local Live4Life School and Community Partnership Group
Engage a local Coordinator
Identify appropriate community members and train them as Teen and Youth Mental Health First Aid® (MHFA) Instructors
Liaise with schools to schedule training for the following year
Deliver Youth MHFA® to school staff in all schools, with the aim to achieve the minimum of 10% staff trained
Deliver Teen MHFA® to year 8 students in all schools (if time allows)
Recruit Crew (from Year 8 cohort) for the following year
Host a Foundations in Evaluation workshop
Our investment in this stage is delivered at no cost to your community.
The Activating stage takes six months to a year to complete.
Stage 3: Implementing
Over the next three years, your community delivers all components of the Live4Life model — again, supported by Live4Life staff:
Induct, train and facilitate the Crew to design, plan and implement mental health promotion events and activities across the calendar year
Run monitoring and evaluation tools and processes
Roll out Teen and Youth Mental Health First Aid® across all schools and community settings
Participate in Communities of Practice
Ensure the local Live4Life School and Community Partnership Group engages actively and regularly
This is a productive and active period for the initiative, in which Live4Life staff work closely with the Lead Agency and School and Community Partnership Group to:
Build local relationships
Establish robust operating structures and processes
Consolidate knowledge and understanding of the model
When these foundations are securely in place, your community is ready to continue delivering the model independently on an ongoing basis. At that point, Live4Life will support your transition to Stage 4.
Our investment in this stage is delivered at no cost to your community.
The Implementing stage takes up to three years to complete.
Stage 4: Established
Based on experience, at the end of Year Four, you will have established the Live4Life model in your community. To further assist in your transition to ongoing implementation, Live4Life staff will work with you to:
Complete the ‘Established’ self-assessment tool
Finalise a transition plan
Confirm you are meeting required ‘Established’ indicators
At that point, your community is ready to transition to Stage 4: Established.
In Stage Four, as an established member of Live4Life, your community continues to receive support from Live4Life, including access to services, such as:
Help desk for troubleshooting and strategic advice on partnerships, funding and advocacy (local, state and national)
Strategic planning
Communications and media support (website, social media, templates and assets)
Communities of Practice hosted by Youth Live4Life
Program Resources (model updates, written materials, video, templates, continued access to e-learning hub)
Advocacy, guidance and information relevant to rural and regional communities around youth mental health and suicide prevention
Invitations to relevant events and activities
Oversight of monitoring and evaluation activities, including access to external evaluation activities
Networking opportunities with other Live4Life Partnership Groups and Crews
Crew Champions for co-facilitation and public speaking (at a cost)
Pathway and support for Crew graduates to join Crew4Life
Participation in annual review and reflection sessions
Our investment in this ongoing stage is largely at no cost to your community but a fee for some services is introduced.
The Established Stage is ongoing
As you settle into the ongoing delivery of Live4Life in your community, elsewhere around Australia, Live4Life continues to intensively support more communities as they activate and implement the Live4Life model.
As time goes by, your community’s experience and expertise in delivering Live4Life will have an important role to play as a leader and exemplar.
Together, we are building a network of activated and engaged rural and regional communities, all committed to improving youth mental health and reducing suicide.
For further information about the Live4Life Expression of interest application, please contact:
Bridie Johnstone
Live4Life Program Support
bridie.johnstone@live4life.org.au
Learn more
“It’s making a huge difference, and we still have so much room to grow.”
— Glenelg Shire Council