Already, and this is the daily This is the Daily.

Ohs oh, now it makes sense.

Good morning and welcome to the Daily Os.

I'm Lucy Tassel and I'm Zara Seidler.

In this installment of our summer series, we're taking a look back at our favorite good news stories of the year.

I'm happy to say there was a lot of good news this year, so much so it was actually hard to choose what we would talk about today.

That is a good problem to have a court dog program where dogs help support people giving evidence at trials rolled out across Sydney, Newcastle, Parramatta and Brisbane.

The AFL held its first Indigenous All Stars around in a decade and it drew the biggest crowds in the event's history, almost four times the last time it was held.

Then there were dozens of incredibly cool scientific developments, things like the creation of a new jealous substance to stabilize coral reefs, the Australian approval of a drug to slow the onset of Alzheimer's disease, or a team of Aussie scientists creating a once a week injection to limit tremors for Parkinson's.

Great news for me personally as a Beyonce fan.

Beyonce became the first black woman to win Best Country Album at the Grammys with her twenty twenty four release Cowboy, Carter and Zara.

If you can even believe it, I have more good news to remind you of from this past year.

I've had a look back over my highlights from the good news we report each and every day and in our dedicated good news newsletter, and to narrow things down, I have chosen to focus on cool achievements from young people this year.

Love that there were a great idea.

There were heaps, So come with me on a trip around the world to meet some inspiring young people doing some amazing things.

I am thrilled we are doing this, Lucy, where are we starting.

I'm going to kick off with a story that really moved me and it genuinely was the first thing that came to mind when I was asked to think about the best news of the year.

So in our trip around the world, this covers a little bit of Asia and a little bit of Europe.

Back in August, the Afghan Youth Orchestra in Exile gave their first full group performance since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in twenty twenty one.

So this group is part of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, which back in Afghanistan used to offer children training in music regardless of their gender, their background, or their social class.

It was based Incable until the Taliban took over, and the school has since found asylum in Portugal.

This group of young people have been training in Portugal ever since then, and they performed in Berlin in August as a whole group for the first time since twenty twenty one.

They performed at a festival called the Young euro Classic, which sees youth orchestras from all around the world perform.

So special and such a good reminder about how important music is in bringing people together.

What did this orchestra perform?

So their program included traditional Afghan instruments.

They said it was about quote loss, indestructibility, and hope, and that it was deeply rooted in the cultures of Afghanistan, standing for humanity and resilience.

The founder of that institute I mentioned, doctor Ahmad Samast, said their performance at the Young Euroclassic was quote a powerful act of cultural resistance, sharing Afghan music with the world at a time when it is being silenced at home.

And as another quick note on Afghan young people's lives since the fall of Kabul.

Back in April, the International Cricket Council announced an initiative to support the development of Afghanistan's women's cricket.

So members of this squad have been displaced since twenty twenty one.

Many of them have found asylum in Australia, and the ICC said the initiative is aimed at quote ensuring every cricketer has the opportunity to shine, regardless of their circumstances, and some of those players have played in Australia since then.

So so good.

So Lucy, that's your good news about young people from Afghanistan.

Where are we heading next?

We are going to the US West coast, Okay to the states of Oregon and California, which are next door to each other.

Over the course of July, a group of young kayakers, many of whom are indigenous, navigated the entire length of a river that stretches from southern Oregon to northern California.

This river is about five hundred kilometers long and they kayaked the entire thing.

Wow.

Yeah, what made this journey.

So special was that this group of the first people to make a quote full descent.

So that's what is that That's what it's called when you go from the mouth of a river to the of a river, so the entire length of the river.

So they're the first people to make that full descent since a group of dams were installed in this river a few years ago.

The dams have since been removed, meaning that the river flows freely.

So they basically took their first opportunity to, you know, complete that achievement.

One of the young people involved was a First Nation's teenager from the Koruk tribe.

Her name is Ruby Rayne Williams.

So she is actually indigenous to the lands along this river, the Klamath River, and they have these people, the Koruk people have a deep cultural connection to the river.

She told The New York Times.

She was quote really excited to be on the river with friends, celebrating this huge accomplishment that our people have been fighting for forever.

And she shouted out.

An organization called Rio's to Rivers, which is a non profit organization that advocates for Indigenous youth and for the health of rivers, and they actually taught these young people how to cut kayak and that's what led them to kayak the entire length of this river.

Incredible, that is an extremely long way.

Yeah goodness all right.

So Lucy, where are we finishing up this global tour of very impressive young people doing excellent things.

We're coming home to Australia.

We had to, didn't we We had to.

I'm going to shine a spotlight on two really cool young ossies.

Their names are Peter Bradley and Joanne Seconti.

So back in January, Peter Bradley braved one point five degree water temperatures to win gold at the ice Swimming World Championships.

Yeah.

I didn't know that existed, No, and now you do, and you know that we won gold.

There you go.

So Peter Bradley joined hundreds of athletes from nearly fifty countries at this competition in northern Italy.

Gold wasn't enough.

She also took home to silver medals from the competition.

And when she's not competing, the twenty nine year old uses the dams on her family's regional New South Wales farm as training pools in the depths of Australian winter.

Wow Okay, a very very strong woman there clearly talk to me about Joanne Seconte.

So Back in March, Joanne, who is sixteen, joined Formula one's all female racing series F one Academy.

As you do at the age of sixteen, as you do.

Absolutely.

The series was set up to help develop women's careers in motorsport.

So Joanne races with MP Motorsport and is the grid's youngest driver.

She said the opportunity was quote a dream come true and that she was excited to be racing in front of the sport's stars at Grand Prix weekends.

As we record this, she is in the top fifteen on the table as the season draws to a close, so we'll be rooting for her.

And just to quickly break my rule of talking about Australia just while we stay in the world of F one.

Back in January, Laura Mueller became at the first ever female race engineer in the sport, working for the team Heats.

So shout out to Laura too.

Shout outs all round, Lucy, thank you so much for that amazing roundup of good news from young people all around the world, and thank you for joining us on the Daily os.

We will be back tomorrow with another recap.

Have a great and RESTful, lovely day till then.

My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda Bunjelung Kalgutin woman from Gadighl Country.

The Daily oz acknowledges that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Straight Island and nations.

We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.