OUTthere History

In 2007 the first ever rural youth and sexual diversity forum was held in Bacchus Marsh, with over 60 young people and workers from sexual diversity youth groups across rural Victoria attending the 3 day event.

It was the first time for many of the young people who attended, to meet other young people from other rural areas and feel like a part of a larger community, one that extended past the walls of their local groups and that was throughout rural Victoria. It was also the first time rural project workers had been able to meet together and share their experiences working on their sexual diversity projects and to discuss future partnerships of the groups. It was the first time this had ever happened for RURAL Victoria.  It is now fondly referred to as Big Gay Camp.

The 3 days were packed from morning to night with workshops, information sessions and activities, and the conversation didn’t stop until people had fallen asleep.  New friendships were formed and new ideas were created.

On the last day all the attendees took part in a strategic planning session.  Young people and workers sat in their groups and developed a plan for the 12 months after the forum, including group events and workshops, community awareness projects, sustainability, promotion, and forming partnerships with schools and other organisations.

One idea that was repeated through all the groups was that they wanted to look towards working together with the other groups across the state, to form an alliance that would provide support across the state and take local projects and campaigns to a state wide level.  This is where the idea for the Rural Youth Council was born, from the minds of the young people who are passionate about making a difference, not only in their local community but all across Victoria.

The council’s first official meeting was held in Thornton (near Alexandra) in July 2008. Over the 3 days the council members developed a constitution, structure, strategic plan, name and a mission statement as well as beginning work on their first projects.

The OUTthere council members agreed upon executive positions and roles and responsibilities of chairperson, deputy chair, secretary and treasurer, the formation of sub-committees to address the objectives in the strategic plan, committee member position roles and responsibilities and meeting frequency and structure.

After 12 months of working on the development of the council, starting work on 4 main projects and taking part in training and skill development sessions, the OUTthere council was officially launched by Dr. Helen Szoke CEO of the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission in July 2009 at the ALSO Foundation’s rural forum held in Ballarat.