As a passionate advocate for the community, ICC Sydney is proud to partner with charitable organisations whose social sustainability values align with our own.
Earlier this month we were delighted to host our valued community partner, Stand Tall, in the successful delivery of their annual youth mental health and wellbeing convention, held as a hybrid event in Aware Super Theatre. In its ninth year running and fifth year at ICC Sydney, Stand Tall 2021 was attended by more than 6,000 students, teachers and mental health professionals with a further 100,000 tuning in to the live-stream or online replay.
In addition to event management, customer service, culinary, audio visual and marketing services provided for Stand Tall 2021, ICC Sydney was pleased to further support the Stand Tall event with volunteers. Volunteer duties included ushering, assisting with sponsor requirements, crowd management, back of house VIP and speaker movement, catering logistics and cloaking requirements. This event provided our team with a rewarding opportunity to lend their skills to an event that is not part of their usual day to day, an event that is truly dedicated to making a difference in the community.
Whether attending in person or virtually, audience members heard from a range of diverse and inspirational speakers including Michelle Payne OAM, Michael Crossland and Aminatah Conteh Biger, as well as Lucas Patchett OAM and Nic Marchesi OAM, the young founders of Orange Sky, a mobile laundry service for homeless people. The moving stories didn’t stop there. Viewers also heard from tech entrepreneur and Motivational Speaker of the Year 2020, Jonny Shannon, not to mention young Alex Noble who became a quadriplegic after a rugby tackle in 2016. While sharing their own moving stories, the speakers together tackled some of the biggest challenges faced by young Australians such as mental health, bullying and overcoming adversity. Viewers also enjoyed a performance by popular musician, Timomatic who returned for the second year in a row to sing, dance and share his own personal journey. Students provided feedback at the close of the event, and the positive impact of the program content is clear, with one commenting, “It has taught me so much and I feel so much more appreciative and happy about my life. I feel so much more confident in who I am and am motivated to enhance my role in society. I am determined to make a change and am completely inspired by all the speakers.”
Having been supported to take place as a virtual event in 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions, Stand Tall utilised ICC Sydney’s expert Audio Visual and IT services to broadcast the event across Australia last March. This year, it was a gratifying for ICC Sydney’s expert team to deliver Stand Tall as a hybrid event for Stand Tall co-founders, Jeanine Treharne and Angela Farr-Jones and their team, allowing the event’s message of hope to reach record numbers of students across the nation.