Preventing youth homelessness

About the program 

Reconnect is an early intervention and prevention program for young people aged 12 to 18 years who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. Reconnect is also available for the families of those young people. Youth who are new to Australia can access the program up to the age of 21. 

Reconnect helps around 7,000 young people each year. Delivered by 70 organisations it spans 101 national services.

The aim of Reconnect is to prevent youth homelessness by working with young people to improve their housing and interactions with:

• family
• education
• training
• employment
• community.

Reconnect helps break the cycle of homelessness by: 

• providing counselling, group work, mediation and support for the whole family
•  collaborating with schools and other services for greater help
• engaging extra services such as specialised mental health.

Review of the Reconnect Program 2024

We engaged Nous Group to conduct an independent review of the Reconnect Program. The review looked at how appropriate, effective and efficient the program is and was finalised in June 2024.

The review heard from over 730 participants including:

• Reconnect clients
• Reconnect providers
• young people with lived experience of homelessness
• state and territory government representatives
• representatives from the housing and homelessness and community services sectors
• academics.

Read the Reconnect Program review final report.