Charity to pilot Minecraft programme for reclusive teens

Teenagers who are socially reclusive can soon play team games and take their first steps in six months to speak to their peers – all without leaving their rooms.

Each week, they will meet in a virtual world in the game Minecraft – which allows players to explore worlds, collect resources and build whatever they want – for a series of activities.

Impart, a charity group that helps youth with problems, has designed games such as a railroad adventure and a parkour activity to teach youth about topics such as healthy living, self-esteem and relationships. The games aim to progressively gear them up with skills to face challenges.

The content is adapted from an intervention programme devised by Dr Cecilia Essau, a developmental psychopathology professor in London. Called Super Skills For Life, it helps young people cope with emotional difficulties such as anxiety and depression.

Around 12 youth aged 13 to 18 in Singapore will be joining the 12-week pilot programme, which is slated to start on Oct 28.

This new initiative to reach out to reclusive youth is the latest of Impart’s programmes to support young people facing adversities. These include those who are not in education, employment, or training, also known as Neet youth.

“We wanted to meet the youth where they are,” said Impart’s co-founder Joshua Tay, 30.

Around 17,000 youth aged 15 to 24 in Singapore were not in school, work or training in 2023. This represents 4.1 per cent of youth in the country, according to the Ministry of Manpower’s 2024 Labour Force Survey.

Mr Tay first met his co-founder Narasimman Tivasiha Mani, 40, in 2015.

Mr Narasimman was a caseworker in Singapore Boys’ Hostel, where Mr Tay had a stint as a supervision staff member. Curious about juvenile offenders, Mr Tay had joined the youth rehabilitative institution during a gap year before starting his studies in Yale-NUS College.

While juvenile offenders were receiving resources to get back on track with life, Mr Tay realised there was a need to support them outside.

Mr Tay teamed up with Mr Narasimman, and for two years, they tried to engage youth through tutoring sessions at a community centre, with little success.

“Something happens every week,” said Mr Narasimman, citing family members relapsing into substance use, youth having conflicts with parents and staying up late on their phones. Other problems include gang delinquencies, neglect and abuse, and incarcerated parents.

So the duo decided to meet young people at their doorstep.

The first teenager they managed to help was 17-year-old Mohammed Narish. He had missed most of his N-level papers as he had overslept and given up, but wanted to try again in 2017, despite his mother telling him he was not cut out for school.

Mr Narasimman, along with some Yale-NUS College students and others, volunteered to tutor the boy at his flat or a shopping mall nearby. But he was often late or did not turn up.

Still, he got Bs and Cs for the N Levels, to the team’s surprise.

“He didn’t understand why these people kept showing up,” said Mr Tay. “Sometimes the group’s centre-based programmes have a three-strike rule, where if you don’t show up a third time, then you’re out. Narish had known that his entire life.”

“It surprised him so much that every time he knew someone was just there waiting for him, he went back home and studied twice as hard.”

Now 24, Mr Narish, an Institute of Technical Education Nitec graduate, has returned to Impart full-time as a youth mental health advocate and paracounsellor with basic counselling skills to provide crisis intervention and emotional support.

Mr Narasimman, who has a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Murdoch University, said he relates to the young people, having struggled with his own mental health, and putting on a strong front. He had sought help from a psychologist at one point.

In the early days of helping youth after he left Singapore Boys’ Hostel in 2020, he survived on his savings for eight months as he did not draw any salary during that period. He even paid out of his pocket to support some youth when they needed cash for groceries, transport and emergency money for crises.

Light came at the end of the tunnel when Mr Tay called him in April 2021 to say they had enough donors and funds to start Impart proper the next month.

Mr Tay, who studied philosophy, politics, and economics and graduated from university in 2021, said he chose a different path from his batch mates, who went into fields such as management consultancy and technology.

“I saw a real need, and I saw that we had a real opportunity to bridge those needs,” he said.

“It happened at a time of my life when I saw more clearly how I had received a lot of grace that brought me to my current place in life. And grace freely received also frees you up to give yourself to another’s needs.”

The team now has 12 full-time staff, three part-time staff and more than 300 volunteers.

In 2022, Ms Nicole Pang joined Impart full-time to start its mental health arm.

Growing from its origins in tutoring, the charity has, over the years, added programmes matching youth with volunteers to teach them coping skills, and sports initiatives. It now serves more than 400 youth each week.

A key challenge for the team is when the youth or their parents refuse help. Mr Narasimman has had to spend much time coaxing a youth to open up.

He recalled how one resistant parent refused to let her son receive Impart’s mental health services, insisting her son did not have such issues. He persuaded her to let her son attend a sports class instead.

On what keeps him going, Mr Narasimman said: “I know what it means to be in a dark place, where no one can understand you, and nothing will work for you.

“The youth could be where they are because many adults have failed them.”

“So I want to run alongside them, even with them pushing me away. We can just be there for them even when they don’t want to be there for themselves.”