Orygen

VU and Orygen are partnering on youth mental health to generate a skilled and qualified workforce, as well as expanding research opportunities and deepening our support for young people experiencing mental ill-health.

Together, VU and Orygen we are growing the mental health workforce of the state’s northwest region by providing a flipped campus location for the delivery of the Orygen Specialist Program and Headspace Werribee on the VU Werribee Campus to bolster the mental health services in Wyndham. 

To grow the skills of the next mental health workforce generation, Orygen provide extensive education and training opportunities for VU students, and collaborate with VU on focusing on collaborative research projects that aim to address the many challenges in Australia’s youth mental health sector.

Benefits and positive results from this partnership include the following:

• Launch of a co-located facility for the Orygen Specialist Program Wyndham and Headspace Werribee on our Werribee Campus to provide enhanced support for young people in the area and opportunities for onsite learning and employment.
• Providing experience to students across VU health and allied health courses in a clinical setting through over 80 placements per year.
• Several VU social work and pyschology students have secured graduate roles with Orygen following their successful placements.
• Training and support is provided by Orygen to the VU Student Counselling and Wellbeing team, resulting enhanced supervision practices and direct referrals for students into care and support.
• Collaboration across a number of research projects exploring the effectiveness of mental health interventions.
• Providing direct access to VU students to the Orygen MOST platform, a digital mental health service for young people aged 12 to 2.