Youth Councils

From the 19^th to the 24^th December, HBYC ran an ice rink that was open to the public; and it proved a huge success.

On the first day the mayor opened the event, and the fun began!

Citizens of all ages came to use the facility, have a laugh on the ice and soak up the festive atmosphere, whilst also donating 50p each admission for charity.

From the donations, a total of £690.52 was raised and 50% was donated to the Help Haiti Charity, and the other half went to Air Ambulance.

Another purpose of the ice rink was to raise awareness of crime and age barriers. Volunteers from HBYC were situated in and around Hinckley town centre, with keyrings and badges etc. These young people stopped passers by and offered them these freebies.

The badges said “talk to me”, and the idea behind this was to try and encourage older and younger members of the public to break down barriers and talk!

As well as this, there were keyrings with slogans like “hide me!”, on the subject of crime, as recent information has shown that the method of breaking and entering, and then proceeding to steal keys on show, resulting in the theft of cars and other vehicles has risen. These keyrings were a simple idea to remind people to put their keys away, and out of view.

By the end of the week we were running out of theses items and crime was DOWN 50% in the area over the period of time the ice rink was in place! I think we can call that a success!

Finally, a HUGE thank-you to all the youth council members, youth workers and everyone else who gave up their time to help out; and thanks to you, the public who contributed their hard earned cash for two great charities.

Thank-you to all!

By Courtney

North West Leicestershire Youth Council’s second ‘Safe’ event, on 17^th February 2010, has gained support from the organisers of the Download Festival, Live Nation. The company had supplied two VIP back stage passes to be awarded as prizes at the event.

Safe will focus on crime and safety – issues identified by the Youth Council as important to young people in the district.

The event is supported by the North West Leicestershire Partnership in Safer Communities and Stephenson College. A number of local organisations have given their support to the event including; Loughborough Women’s Aid, Turning Point, the Fire Service, Youth Offending Service, Youth Service and the Police.

A range of stands giving out community safety information will be based at Stephenson College from 1pm until 4pm. All local residents are welcome.

Young people from the area are then invited to workshops in the evening. These will focus on a variety of issues including; road safety, knife crime, anti-social behaviour and domestic abuse. The event promises to be informative yet fun. Young people will have the opportunity to debate community safety issues that matter to them, and give feedback to professionals working in the field.

Councillor Trevor Pendleton, Children and Young People’s Champion for North West Leicestershire District Council and Chair of the Partnership in Safer Communities said: “We are really excited about the support we have received from Live Nation for this event. Safe is in its second year and we hope this one will be as successful as the first.

“We are also delighted to have sponsorship from UB Logistics this year. It is really good to see local businesses supporting initiatives to help the young people in our district.

“I am looking forward to meeting the young people who attend, and getting feedback on the issues that matter to them. These will help influence local authority policy making and ensure that we have an understanding of what issues matter to young people locally.”

For more information about the Safe event, contact Gillian Haluch at North West Leicestershire District Council on: 01530 454545 or email: Gillian.haluch@nwleicestershire.gov.uk.

Hi all and welcome to the HBYC January news feed, which gives you information about recent activity amongst the youth council, and up and coming projects.

Firstly, our Ice rink was a great success, with people of all ages turning up to have a go and enjoy the winter weather. Have a browse round the HBYC pages of The Jitty and you will find a report about the opening of the ice rink, and watch this space for a report about how successful the event was!

Our most recent meeting was the 4th of January, and a representative from Leicestershire County Council to talk to us about how we felt about access to local services, such as Connexions and the emergency services. He asked us a few questions, and there was a general discussion. Hopefully, there will be more of this in future updates.

The main sub groups, anti-bulling & racism, drugs & alcohol, and facilities gave us all a brief update on what they had discussed in their sub group meetings beforehand, and what their projects were for the coming months.

Our residential is fast approaching, and everyone going seemed enthusiastic in the January meeting. A mysterious cannon challenge was on the agenda, with Malcolm acting very mysterious... All will be revealed in the next news feed!

I hope you all had a great Christmas and A Happy new year, and hope to see you at our next meeting which is the 8th of February, from 5:30pm until 8:30pm at the Hinckley Council Offices.

Taxis can be arranged through HBYC, for more information contact us.

By Courtney

Harborough Youth Council's postponed SPOTLIGHT conference has been re-organised to take place on Friday, February 6th.

Aimed at the development of Student Councils in the Harborough District, SPOTLIGHT will help to build on skills ready for school councils to take back and work to promote the Voice of Young People.

Anyone wishing to attend is requested to contact HYC's Chair, Tim, on harborough@thejitty.com

A temporary ice rink has been set up in The Borough, Hinckley (near the NatWest bank) for all ages. The Youth Council are running the rink from Saturday 19th untill Thursday 24th, from 11AM - 7PM.

The chair of the Youth Council opened the rink with Santa (the Mayor of Hinckley) and two of his trusted elves as the crowds cheered. On the first day of opening there were lots of people and we are hoping there will be many more during the week. There is a good atmosphere with music playing, families watching and everyone having a go.

The ice rink has been placed in Hinckley to reach all the community and to promote HBYC. We all have bright coloured badges saying "talk to me" to encourage people to talk to one another and break the barriers in the Community. Christmas is a great time to meet new people and get involved in the Community!

So, come on down to The Borough and have a go! Merry Christmas!

Welcome to the HBYC December 2009 Update. This is where you'll find the recent news and activity updates from the Youth Council. Also upcoming events and general information which is relevant to you!

The ice rink. From the 19^th-24^th Yes Xmas eve!!! HBYC will be running an ice rink, open to the public, to help keep young people occupied and safe his Christmas. The ice rink is a place for you, and your families and friends, to have fun and enjoy the Christmas season. But it’s also an event to raise awareness of issues raised by YOU. There will be information about crime, safety and other issues that YOU have told us that you think are important. So, come along, and enjoy the ice. There will be small charge/donation, to use the ice rink, and all proceeds will go to charity. (Skates are provided).

Our young people’s conference. Recently we held a young peoples conference for representatives form all the local schools to get together and raise issues and ideas in the local area, and for the young people to decide on HBYC’s 3 priorities for the next year. They are:

1. More facilities for teens,
2. Bullying and racism,
3. Drugs, alcohol and smoking.

Christmas party. The 14^th of December is our Xmas party with all the other youth councils in the area. It’s free to come in fancy dress and £1 to come without a costume! There’s going to be lots of charity games, so youth councillors, bring your pennies!! Also our lovely Alex will be DJing his way through the night to make it awesome

Lea Green Residential. In the New Year, it’s the residential for HBYC. A nice relaxing break… not!! There’ll be some team building activities and lots of games… and I don’t care what MJ says, I am eating whether thetimetablesays so or not!! It should be great!!

So... if you fancy coming along to HBYC any time, come along to our next meeting which is 4^th January 2010, at the Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council Offices. Any questions or general ponders, contact us OR post a thread on The Jitty Chat Forum.

Hope to see you at our next meeting! By Courtney S

Young people can now report the behaviour of the bus drivers e.g. smoking and badlanguage. You can also report on the state e.g. keeping bus untiddy as well as badbehaviour of the other pupils because you need a safer journey to and from school. If peopleor the bus driver are doing the wrong thing: tell someone or tell a teacher at school.

If you don't, there could be serious consiquences so find a seat, stay in it until the bus stops at your stop.

You dont want an accident do you?

IF IT'S NOT REPORTED
IT DON'T GET SORTED

by Karl

Harborough Youth Council have made the unfortunate decision to postpone SPOTLIGHT, their youth conference until the new year; due to lack of attendance.

For more information, email HYC on harborough@thejitty.com

We apologise for any problems this may cause.

It’s 7:30am, it’s raining outside, and Malcolm is striding around in his Slumberland hippo shirt demanding paper, coffee, and pretty much everything, but all the members are here, setting up the conference, and all happy (in fact Malc may be hysterical). Hoodies have just been handed out, and everyone looks dudeish!

So what are the expectations of the young people attending?
“I think the day will be fun and we will learn new things and tips to improve the school council” Ellie said, and when asked how they felt about being at the conference, the general feeling among young people was optimistic, with comments like “Excited, Ecstatic, happy and anticipating”.

After the schools had been signed in, the Mayor opened the conference, with a few words about HBYC and the youth work in the area, encouraging the young people here to speak out. During the speeches and presentations that followed, the young people were engaged and seemed to be taking in what was being said.

After a short break, everybody headed to the workshops, and the attendees looked excited and interested, whereas the HBYC members looked slightly terrified! (especially Phil!).

MJ, Chair of HBYC was very pleased with the exceptional turnout, but a little embarrassed, as the orange groups presentation included a photograph of her!!

Throughout the day, I visited all the workshops, and the first was the Green workshop, run by Libby and Bhavik, the subject of which was cyber bullying, and bullying generally. The workshop included a quiz; using racquet shaped whiteboards and lettered flash cards. The group seemed interested and were shocked when they found out that “one in five children are affected by cyber bullying”.

The next workshop was run by Tillie, Chloe, Alex and Karl. Tillie and Chloe were ‘front of house’ presenting about HBYC in general. The workshop was done in quite a light hearted manor, which amused most, but some members of the audience were getting slightly impatient, and may have benefited from a more straight to the point workshop-style, although most people(including myself), enjoyed the workshop.

The final workshop was based around the issue of drugs and alcohol, and was run by Bobbie and Xav, with assistance from Charlotte, Charlie, and Chloe. (Sorry if you have been missed out!). Bobbie did well to keep the audience interested, with lots of props including glasses demonstrating the amount of units in alcoholic drinks, and a display board of how the liver is “killed” by alcohol, which was passed around -much to the disgust of some of the more squeamish students!- everything was running smoothly, until Xav knocked over a table with the display on, and left his colleges to clear up, typical!

Finally, there was a workshop for the adults, both teachers and youth workers. This was run by Mackenzie and Matt. They basically spoke about new improvements, such as POP (the pyramid of participation), and asked the teachers to talk about their school council, both good and bad points. The adults seemed enthusiastic and willing to take on constructive criticism, and advise others. After lunch the groups worked on the priorities for HBYC to carry out work on their behalf. All in all an exceptional conference run by an experienced Youth Council team.

By Courtney!

Charnwood Youth Conference 14th October 2009
Loughborough Town Hall.

Anjali, Poppie, Michael, Dominic

Well, here we are at 2009’s Charnwood Youth Conference, their third conference aimed at raising awareness of the excellent work they’ve done over the years on behalf of young people in the area. Approximately 50 young people have made the journey to Loughborough’s impressive Town Hall venue to discuss the issues that affect young people in the area, and hopefully, make a positive difference.

So what are the aims of the conference, or rather what issues do they want to focus on. Historically, the aims have typically been transport, facilities and crime / safety, so are the same issues still top of the list? Those three issues were certainly mentioned along with some new ones such as having secure bins, cleaner streets (with more lighting), more drinking fountains available in public places and more park benches. Specifically for young people, designated Graffiti walls / art projects were mentioned along with more facilities such as Restaurants / Sports Halls / Bowling Alley. Also, one of the biggest problems is the black hole of music that is Leicestershire. If you were to go to Wolverhampton’s Civic Hall or Wulfrun, or even Nottingham’s legendary Rock City or Royal Concert Hall, there are gigs running every week, rock, pop, contemporary. It seems a lot of bands on tour just seem to disregard Leicestershire.

Transport has always been an issue, and not one that’s easy to solve, taxi fares are understandably too expensive for young people, and the bus service run on Sundays is inadequate. And those who might be lucky enough to own their own cars, free parking, or rather the lack of it was also an annoyance.

By way of background, CYCLe’s (County Youth Council for Leicestershire) Pyramid of Participation video was shown to the audience so that they could get a greater understanding of how the Youth Councils are organised in Leicestershire. The groups of young people were then asked what they would like to change in their immediate area / where they live, with similar result to before being voiced. Attendees were also told about the yearly residential, which for the most part have taken part at the Brathay venue, as well as an explanation of the Youth Council’s executive, and the democratic process of how those are elected..

All in all a fantastic day, organised by the Youth Council, so well done! And hopefully we'll see some people froim the conference joining you soon!