Image by UK Parliament via Flickr

The full CYP Now manifesto and comments can be found on their site by scrolling to the middle of the home page…

http://www.cypnow.co.uk/

My comments did appear in the magazine and website on behalf of Young NCB and the National children’s bureau.

http://www.ncb.org.uk/ – Main NCB Website

http://blog.ncb.org.uk/ -  NCB Blog

http://www.youngncb.org.uk/home.aspx – Young NCB (If you are under the age of 18 then you can join NCB and have your comments heard. They are currently recruiting members for their young Advisory Board, so do become a member and apply!) UK Only

The importance of providing young people with out of school activities within a safe distance from their home. I.e. does kidwarrior agree that young people should have a mixture of opportunities available to them wherever they live in England?  

The number of opportunities available in England still seem to be based around where the majority of people are located, while smaller places such as villages are often ignored/not considered. When opportunities  are available they are not always on convenient days and are not always widely available. For example, the new library campaign called “Headspace” is only available in selected libraries across the country. The problem with this means that opportunities are not always based within their particular community in their town or city. Travel costs prohibit the development of essential social skills required in workplaces and school because it is simply too expensive to use bus transport or it’s just not viable for the attendee to walk. If a mixture of opportunities are to be brought into communities it would widen young people’s social circles, networks and understanding of people from different backgrounds and cut down youth crime rate as many crimes committed by young people is often due to a need to alleviate boredom. It will help to abolish particular stereotypes that one may have about other peers. Closer communities, closer opportunities, creates a safe and comfortable environment for all to live within. However, the problem of the number of young people who will access these opportunities is still dependent on the basis that it is free, as often young people’s parents cannot subsidise the costs. These out of school activities could also include career counselling services as well as many young people are uncertain of the correct career for them to follow.

Whether all young people should be entitled to more specialist help if they have a particular need, such as housing issues or problems with their parents, as the document call for.

So many spending cuts have been made to young people’s specialist advisers such as; “Connexions”. The problem with this is that often young people who require help or guidance cannot find somebody who they can approach and trust. Previously, the concept of school nurses coming into schools was to make sure that if somebody had a concern of anything they could speak to somebody they did not know directly. But, as time has gone by, school nurses are now responsible for more schools and so cannot provide this service very often. Specialist help is available but it is just not sufficient to support the individual anymore. Young people who may have a particular need or concern often stay quiet because to receive the help they need, numerous channels of networks are contacted to find a specialist. Specialist services need to be available in the mainstream so that advice is directly available and not through channels of networks!

Also does she have any thoughts about the importance of volunteering and even our call to stop the investment in the National Citizen Service and spend the money on existing established initiatives instead?

Volunteering is an essential  part of being a good citizen but, I feel that if you want to be a good citizen you won’t do it over one summer in some national program, it should be done across many years so that learning can be passed on. The Manifesto states “NCS would be better used in supporting and developing existing year-round volunteering opportunities for young people across the age range”. It may look good on a CV to show that you did support the National Citizen Service but, the employer or the higher education authority should be focused on the numerous local projects, completed throughout their secondary school life. This will show that they have a passion for what they did and that it was evidently for selfless intentions.

Another way of looking at ‘volunteering’ would be to make it part of the national curriculum and UCAS points etc should be awarded to students who volunteer, as ‘volunteers’ develop better social communication skills and empathy towards others.

The success of this manifesto is reliant on the basis of how well we will be able to make it happen. There are several factors that could enhance the success of the manifesto but, I feel that these three would be best:

1. If we want to “Strengthen young people’s role in decision making”, we have to increase the awareness of this manifesto and its contents, gaining maximum exposure and ensuring that young people get the message and are aware that there is a ‘national and local youth scrutiny board’ that is working on their behalf, through a variety of media channels to support positive change in the perceptions of young people. This would ensure that their opinions are brought to the attention of the nation so that they can see the true value of young people and impacts parliament.
2. We are going to need “Professional adult volunteers” to ‘mentor’ young people maximising the impact of our initiatives so that young people’s voices have a strong impact on society and government. This will mean that young people will be able to seek and learn from these ‘mentors’ when required and they can act as ‘points of contact’ to aid decision-making and enhance the effectiveness of national campaigns.
3. The marketing initiative will require youth to engage other young people. This will mean that the marketing campaign will be created with youth at the forefront, recommending and overseeing what strategies they know will work because they are the target audience.

Related articles

• Supporting Young People Who are Targets of Bullying and Other Negative Peer Behavior (education.com)
• To Young People Everywhere (evasantiago.wordpress.com)
• Young people feel depressed about their futures. Why? Blame it on the celebs. (o2.co.uk)
• Should volunteering be rewarded with a prize? (jvnblog.com)
• Young people speak out against bus cuts (bettertransport.org.uk)
• Our challenge – Eradicate child poverty (mubbisherahmed.wordpress.com)
• Parliament passes national youth policy (gabzfmnews.wordpress.com)
• You: Gang violence and knife crime rise as local authorities cut youth services (guardian.co.uk)

Image via Wikipedia

The youth of  today will be tomorrow’s world. It is the first generation of bloggers, Internet resource users and most importantly the first generation to have its own youth panel.These resources weren’t available 20 to 30 years ago and this is what will make this generation unique and one that will bring serious change.

Teenagers are often given a bad reputation. As people go past a teenager they turn their heads and walk in the opposite direction.

Why are people scared of them?

They are only human and they have flesh,bones and most importantly a heart. If they are standing on some kind of street corner or in a park, they haven’t marked the territory as theirs; they’re just there because they have nowhere else to be with friends. As every other place costs money.

Now this is where the youth parliament c comes to the rescue.

UKYP (United Kingdom Youth Parliament) is a group of youths from all over the country who are voted by pupils in education from the age of 11:18. This allows children to negotiate on big issues that can be made small by collaborating on a situation. At the moment the UKYP is focusing on three main areas that affect their learning, these topics are:

• Get Board-cheaper bus fare for all.
• Free For All- university, scrapping tuition fee’s.
• Political education for all.

These topics are issues that are progressing. The UKYP meets at parliament twice a year with new representatives each year.

So how can I stand up for Elections?

All you  have to do is go to www.ukyouthparliament.org.uk

Then register at the top of the website. By doing this you will be able to receive opportunities in your area and sign up to a forum. Once you have registered it would be a good idea to go to the tab “get involved” as this holds many ways to get support. Click the secondary tab called “Become a UKYP.

Click on this and search for your town/city on the list and then email the person in charge of your youth forum and request to become a UKYPMP in advance for the elections.

I would like to say how fantastic this idea is of a youth parliament and hope that this handy site will carry on creating a future for these young minds of tomorrow.

Related articles

• Parliament adopts Youth policy (gabzfmnews.wordpress.com)
• Parliament passes national youth policy (gabzfmnews.wordpress.com)
• You: Provincial Youth Assembly (nation.com.pk)
• BBC Blast – Celebrating Youth (kidwarrior.wordpress.com)