The Budget also allocated £2m for a national competition for youth projects funded by the Youth Opportunity Fund. Youth minister Beverley Hughes told Young People Now: "We want to use that money to celebrate the achievements of young people, not least to counter some of the negative images that dominate the media."
Equally encouraging are the signs that the media is slowly beginning to change the way it views young people. In 2004, Young People Now commissioned research company Mori to analyse how young people were portrayed in the press. The results, which were widely reported, showed that 71 per cent of articles written about young people were negative and only 14 per cent were positive.
This year Mori revisited the research and found that while the percentage of positive stories has remained around the same (12 per cent), there has been an increase in the number of stories that were classed as "neutral", either making no judgment about young people or showing them both negatively and positively in the same story. In 2004, neutral stories made up 15 per cent of coverage. But in 2005 this had doubled to 30 per cent. However, the majority of stories - 57 per cent - remained negative.
Despite the improvement, more progress is needed. There are still newspaper stories where the words "yob" and "teenager" are interchangeable. Magistrates still make decisions to "name and shame" juvenile offenders, as in a recent case where magistrate Margaret Bates ruled that a 14-year-old girl convicted of drink driving could be named. But the youth groups, young people, councils and media outlets rewarded in this year's Positive Images Awards, who received their certificates this week at a ceremony at the House of Commons in front of MPs, media representatives and youth organisations, will go some way towards achieving more balanced coverage of youth issues in the media.
Joyce Moseley, chief executive of young people's charity Rainer, which is supporting the Positive Images Awards, says: "Young people are much more likely to be victims of crime than criminals. But the fear of crime has been growing out of all proportion. It is up to us to make sure young people are given the voice they need to break through stereotypes and shout about all the amazing things they do every day."
BEST NATIONAL PRESS COVERAGE OF YOUNG PEOPLE
WINNER: CosmoGIRL!
The judges were impressed by CosmoGIRL!'s positive portrayal of young women. CosmoGIRL! of the Year 2005, an article published last December, featured six young women whose achievements ranged from campaigning and fundraising, to 17-year-old Hannah Sanders from Hull, who flew a helicopter solo.
One of the winners, Josie Vallely from Edinburgh, has her own web site, I Want to Change the World (www.freewebs.com/iwanttochangetheworld123).
She says: "It's so rewarding to be recognised for my achievements. It feels good to be doing positive things but it is also fun."
Celia Duncan, editor of CosmoGIRL!, says: "While every CosmoGIRL! reader is unique, there's something that unites them all: the determination to get the most out of life. Sifting through the entries to CosmoGIRL! of the year was humbling as so many young women had achieved so much."
The magazine is also running a campaign for sex and relationships education to be made compulsory in schools. It featured "two inspiring teens who are changing the face of sex and relationships education" in its coverage.
BEST TELEVISION COVERAGE
WINNER: Young Black Farmers - Channel 4 and Diverse Productions
This three-part series documented the activities of a group of nine urban Black teenagers - four young men and five young women - who spent the summer of 2005 living in a converted barn on a remote 30-acre farm in the countryside. They were left in the charge of Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, who claims to be the UK's only Black farmer, and who is campaigning to open up the countryside to Black and ethnic minorities.
The series showed the young people, most of whom had spent little or no time in the countryside, embarking on work experience placements in the community and helping on the farm. The young people aimed to make a change in their lives, and two of them were offered a job working for Emmanuel-Jones.
BEST INVOLVEMENT BY A YOUNG PERSON IN PROMOTING POSITIVE MEDIA PORTRAYAL
WINNER: Ashanti Fearon
Nineteen-year-old Ashanti Fearon gave birth to her son, Kayden, when she was 16. As a young mum, Ashanti is part of a group of young people who rarely get a good press. She agreed to take part in YWCA's Respect Young Mums campaign, which aimed to raise awareness of the challenges faced by teenage mothers, confronting a sometimes hostile media, and speaking out about the prejudices and difficulties she and many others face. She was featured in Sugar magazine, interviewed by Radio 4, and spoke at last year's Labour Party Conference and at London's capitalwoman conference.
"A lot of people put me down, and I was so angry to see the way young mums were often presented in the media," she says. "I thought that telling my story to them was a good way of showing it wasn't like that. I really liked doing it, though at first it was really nerve-wracking, and it sometimes took a lot of my time. But it has helped YWCA's campaign and given me a lot of confidence."
JUDGING PANEL
ANUSHKA ASTHANA, education correspondent, The Observer
Anushka joined The Observer in July 2003 as a general reporter, covering a wide range of areas but also trying to focus on youth issues. She won a Positive Images award in 2005.
MANIA HOSSAINI, 17, Member of UK Youth Parliament
Mania has been an MYP for three years. She is also a member of YAK (youth action kouncil) and studies english literature, sociology and drama at A-level.
ELAINE OKYERE, 22, editorial assistant/junior sub editor, Cosmo Bride
Elaine has carried out work experience at The Guardian, Sugar, Bliss and Young People Now magazines. She completed a postgraduate diploma in magazine journalism at City University, London, in 2005. Additionally, Elaine used to mentor ethnic-minority young offenders in Leicester.
MELODY HOSSAINI, co-chair, board of trustees, UK Youth Parliament
At 13, Melody was one of the founder members of the UK Youth Parliament. In November 2005, she became the first female to co-chair the board of trustees. Last year, she won the prestigious Home Office 'Volunteer of the Year' award.
KATIE WALKER, young people's worker for Havant and South East Hampshire
Katie has worked for Connexions since September 2005. Before this she was a teaching assistant for four- to 19-year-olds on a children's ward. She is part of a team of 10 young people's workers employed across the Connexions South Central partnership area.
SALLY DOGANIS, trustee, Rainer
Sally has been a trustee of young people's charity Rainer since 2003, and held posts at Carlton Television, including head of development and special projects. She has also been a senior/executive producer at BBC TV and has written a book on child abuse.
ASHLEY SWEETLAND, director of youth strategy and engagement, Corporate Culture
Ashley joined campaigning and marketing agency Corporate Culture in October 2005 as director, youth strategy and engagement. From February 2004 until November 2005, he served on the board of trustees of the UK Youth Parliament as co-chairman. He is a member of the Russell Commission's Youth Advisory Board.
GARMON AP GARTH, young people's co-ordinator at The Foyer Federation
Garmon's role is to help ensure that young people's voices are heard, both within the Foyer network and externally.
SEAN LARKINS, director of communications, Youth Justice Board
Sean was a managing consultant and head of inclusivity within strategic consultancy at COI Communications, the Government's communications agency. He has worked on social, ethical and inclusivity communication for organisations including Barnardo's, BT, the Environment Agency and Save the Children in the UK and Africa.
DEJA MARIUS, sessional youth worker, East Homes
Deja has been a sessional youth worker at East Potential, a subsidiary of East Homes housing group, for a year. Before working for the housing group, she was a part-time teaching assistant in Romford, Essex, and also delivered music workshops.
BEST MAGAZINE OR WEB SITE PRODUCED BY YOUNG PEOPLE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
WINNER: Zeal
Zeal magazine faced stiff competition from youth groups around the country to win this popular category. The magazine manages to straddle both sections of the award by producing a magazine, published twice a year, and a web site, www.zealmagazine.co.uk.
A core of 10 young people from Essex, Southend and Thurrock youth services, including editor David Kelly, 19, work at Zeal each week, and other young people provide articles and other contributions on an ad-hoc basis.
The team estimates that 25,000 young people in Essex read Zeal, either via one of the 5,000 printed copies sent out to the youth mailing list or through one of the 20,000 flyers that advertise the magazine and provide a link to the web site. The group also writes its own press releases to advertise each issue of the magazine.
Articles tackle issues ranging from self-harm, teen stereotypes, fashion, bullying and Harry Potter. The judges were particularly impressed by the title's striking design.
BEST RADIO COVERAGE OF YOUNG PEOPLE
WINNER: BBC Merseyside Bus Team
The BBC Bus on Merseyside aims to give 11- to 25-year-olds the means to tell their own stories, both on BBC Radio Merseyside and on the BBC Liverpool web site. The stories can be about youth issues or general subjects that happen to be told by a young person, and are broadcast across the schedule. Young people have also helped the team to create trailers for news and sport programmes. Pauline McAdam, senior broadcast journalist (communities) at BBC Radio Merseyside, says: "This gives listeners access to young voices without an agenda or issue. Put simply, the young voices are where they should be; part of the community without having to justify why they are there."
Topics have included youth participation in politics, young people teaching grandparents to rap, and the poetry of young people with disabilities.
The judges were impressed by the way the team brought the voices of perceived hard-to-reach young people to the air. "How often do you hear looked-after young people on the radio talking about being in care?" commented one judge.
McAdam says: "We have been privileged to work with young people with such enormous energy and creativity, and they have all taught us a great deal. Mostly they have taught us that we are right to keep instructing them to tell their stories."
BEST PUBLICITY CAMPAIGN BY A YOUTH GROUP
WINNER: Young Persons Reference Group, Connexions Cheshire and Warrington
Angela Murney, Becki Tomkins, Calum McManus, Dayne Davies and Mark Hawkhead are a group of young people from Cheshire and Warrington. Last year, concerned about the potential disbandment of the Connexions service, which they read about in the education pages of The Times and The Guardian, they campaigned to gain positive publicity for Connexions Cheshire and Warrington.
They wrote to government ministers, including Tony Blair, Beverley Hughes and Margaret Hodge, and organised a postcard campaign that won the support of young people in 11 other Connexions partnership areas. A letter written by the group was published in the Times Educational Supplement, and the young people were interviewed by the media for other articles.
Calum McManus says: "We thought of an email campaign at first, but we realised that might exclude young people without computers, so we decided to write a letter to Tony Blair and print postcards which we could distribute to other young people, so they could get involved." Calum also wrote an article for Young People Now (YPN, 23 February-1 March, p11) in which he gave his views on why Connexions should be saved. "I wrote that we feel really strongly about this. An organisation like Connexions needs time to grow and get on its feet," he says.
BEST ONLINE COVERAGE OF YOUNG PEOPLE
WINNER: BBC Blast Young Reporters Scheme 2005 (www.bbc.co.uk/blast/local)
Blast is a BBC project aiming to build the confidence and creativity of young people aged 13 to 19. The Young Reporters Scheme is for 16- to 19-year-olds who would gain from doing work placements with a local BBC team.
The young people receive two days of training, a mentor from the BBC and an eight-week work placement in the summer. They work alongside their BBC local radio station team to create a Blast section on its regional web site. The minimum requirement was for the young reporter to write at least one article a week and to create a diary that could also be published online. Some young people also created content for the television news.
Laura Snapes, 16, from Cornwall, says: "One of the best parts of the training weekend was the class about researching and reporting. We were told to create a news story based on the nursery rhyme Jack and Jill, which made us all think quite hard."
BEST LOCAL PRESS COVERAGE OF YOUNG PEOPLE
WINNER: Evening Chronicle, Newcastle
The Newcastle Evening Chronicle's entry to the awards stated: "One of the biggest issues facing the Northeast is the comparatively poor record we have in terms of the achievements of young people." Aspirations among young people in the area are low, with poor school staying-on rates. There are few business start-ups and low achievement in terms of educational qualifications. But rather than use this as an excuse to harangue the youth of Newcastle, the paper featured positive stories about young people in an attempt to inspire others into action.
It launched its Young Achiever Awards, which are now in their fifth year, and filled its pages with young people who have been successful. One such teenager was Jill Scott, 18, who has captained the under-19 England women's football team; Nathan Watson, 19, who achieved academic success despite missing school because of bullying; and Arman Esfandiari, 17, who achieved 12 GCSEs despite not speaking English when he arrived from Iran two years ago.
Editor Paul Robertson says: "Too often newspapers and the media in general are criticised for being full of bad news. The supplements and the stories we have carried throughout the Young Achiever campaign is one way of showing how the Chronicle is determined to highlight the many positive contributions young people are making."
MOST YOUTH-FRIENDLY COUNCIL
WINNER: Lancashire County Council
Sixteen-year-old Arif Khan is Lancashire's Youth Ambassador, a role that involves him shadowing Clive Grunshaw, the council's cabinet member for children and young people. "A lot of young people feel patronised by adults and it is important for them to have a say in decisions that affect them," says Arif. Lancashire takes that seriously. It has produced a DVD called SPARK (See Politics As Real Kool), which aims to get young people involved in politics.
The council, which recently secured Beacon status for youth participation, is proud of its work to engage young people. For example, it runs the Breaking Barriers in Burnley project, which brings together young people from different communities most affected by the disturbances in 2001.
Lancashire is the holder of the Assembly of European Region's Most Youth-friendly Region in Europe. Its other youth projects include U and the Q - a project to gather young people's views and feed them into South Ribble Borough Council's five-year delivery plan; and Portal Constructor, which trains young people to add content to the local authority's web site.
