The Isle of Wight Youth Council has received support for its ‘Youth Voice Award’ – also known as YoVA – from Councillor Paul Brading, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services and Education, and Councillor Dave Stewart, Leader of the Council.
The award, developed by the Youth Council, aims to recognise outstanding engagement by schools with young people. It has 3 tiers, bronze silver and gold. Criteria range from having a ‘you said, we did’ board for a Bronze to having a student on the board of governors for Gold.
Details of the scheme were first shared with schools before the end of the summer term and the Youth Council has had a positive response so far and hopes to hand out the first batch of awards soon after the Christmas break.
During the groups November meeting the ‘YoVA’ award was introduced to Cllr Stewart and Cllr Brading and after a brief Q&A they both voiced their support the Youth Council’s initiative.
If you want to know more about the Youth Voice Award an explainer video has been produced by Tom Jackson, the Chair of the Group, to help promote the launch before the summer.
The Youth Council, elected every 2 years, come together each month to talk about Youth Issues and make steps to improve opportunities for the Young People of the Island working with teams from across County Hall and outside organisations such as the Hampshire and IOW Police Youth Commission and the IOW Youth Trust.
Tom Jackson, Chairman of the Isle of Wight Youth Council said:
“We have had some great submissions so far and are looking forward to receiving more in the future. YoVA is one of the major steps we’ve made recently to bring the Islands young people together so we can have a real say on the services that affect us.”
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Schools can now download the application form from www.iwight.com/youthcouncil and can submit their work to [email protected] to be considered. More information can be found on the groups social media feeds:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/iowyouthcouncil
Twitter: www.twitter.com/iwyouthcouncil_
Instagram: www.instagram.com/iwyouthcouncil/
