Narooma's Stephanie Ovington emerged from The Y NSW Youth Parliament program inspired.
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The Narooma High School Year 12 student said the most important thing that she learnt was getting an understanding of the parliamentary process and how making change to people's lives can occur.
Ms Ovington, together with Bega High School's Lucy Allen, was selected from hundreds to represent the Bega electorate on the program which culminated in debating a bill in NSW Parliament.
She and two other students on the Rural and Regional Affairs committee drafted a bill on access to maternal and peri-natal care in regional and rural areas.
"Writing the bill and learning the process of making legislation and learning how powerful it can be in people's lives was very inspiring," she said.
Ms Ovington said understanding that process is always going to be beneficial to her.
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Before she went on the program Ms Ovington was a "bit politically interested but I came out with a lot more understanding of what it is like, how decisions are made and all the considerations of people's views".
"It was great to stand in politicians' shoes for a while and try that out," she said.
As well as debating the bill, she delivered a private member's statement about the importance of kids in rural and regional areas having access to the same opportunities as kids in cities.
Students on the program who were from cities were not aware there was a difference.
However all the students on her Rural and Regional Affairs committee were passionate about the topic because they had experienced it themselves.
Values the knowledge gained
Their bill was "massive" and took a long time to write.
It covered three areas, had 72 clauses and 10,000 words.
"We spent afternoon after afternoon on Zoom but it was lots of fun and pretty cool," Ms Ovington said.
They were the first group to debate a bill so it was "very scary".
"After three months writing the bill you get very passionate and we tried to get it passed without any amendments."
The bill did pass, but with amendments.
She said program highlights included morning tea with NSW Governor Margaret Beazley and talking to a few politicians which was "surreal".
She enjoyed meeting so many different people she would not otherwise have and valued being in Parliament and having all that knowledge on legislation and bill writing given to her.
"It was super cool to see the possibilities of politics so I might end up there one day."
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