Back on Track

Description

Temporarily out of stock

ISBN: 9780733642128
Title: Back on Track
Author: SHAKESHAFT BERNIE

As a kid, Bernie Shakeshaft’s mischievous and reckless behaviour led him to became known as the wild one of his devout Catholic family. It isn’t surprising that his path led him to the Northern Territory, a place where people often go to either lose themselves or find themselves. Bernie, a searcher for his purpose in life, found himself.



He had many jobs, firstly as a ringer on a cattle station owned by the Packer family, and later as a dingo trapper for the Parks and Wildlife Service. Throughout it all, he drank, he swore, he fought, and took chances with his own well-being. But, crucially, he also developed deep connections with the Indigenous people, and it was these connections that helped lay the foundations for what was to come. He worked for youth welfare organisations, and all the while he built up his knowledge about helping wayward youths, particularly those from Indigenous communities.



Years later, Bernie was living in Armidale. He’d been visiting too many kids in prison and going to too many funerals. The usual methods weren’t working so that reckless, mischievous kid inside him decided he could do better. He started a youth program called BackTrack, with three aims: To keep them alive, out of jail and chasing their hopes and dreams.



For most, this was their last chance. Combining life skills, education, job preparedness with rural work,