Tipu Skills for Life is empowering young girls in the Bay of Plenty to value themselves and uncover their future potential.

As a non-for profit organisation, Tipu Skills for Life started in 2011 and was founded by Stuart and Prue Caldwell.

The married pair have been involved in our community's support services for years.

After being approached by a social worker saying 10-year-old girls from a local school were socially smoking with their mothers, Stuart and Prue knew there was a need to support young girls.

Amazing girls

The course that Tipu facilitates runs for eight weeks and is for primary girls aged eight to 10 years old to intervene early. 'The skills that we offer the girls are basic life skills around identifying emotion so they'll be able to understand what's going on inside of them and be able to express that,” says Prue.

'We talk about healthy and unhealthy relationships –a lot of these girls are from disadvantaged homes and a lot of them may not know what a healthy relationship looks like.”

Prue says Tipu is non-judgemental and works alongside what is already great in families and their daughters. 'We say to families: ‘Hey we see you've got amazing things in your girl and we just want to help her make choices'.” The programme also focuses on teaching the girls about self-worth and discovering their passions 'to empower them to make a positive future”.

Committed mentors

Through the Tipu, programme, young people are matched with a mentor who supports them for a year minimum for one-to-two hours each week.

'Mentors are community relationship based… they're someone who journey's alongside the young person and go out, have fun and be that safe, non-judgmental person,” says Prue.

'Mentors can be aged from 18 to 80, so some of these girls have never had a Nan so having an older mentor fills in that gap… we're that third person for families.”

Currently Prue is on the lookout for mentors the Te Puke region. If you would like to join the Tipu team and support a young person email: prue@skillsforlife.org.nz or call: 0274768459.