Young People are our Future project gets off to a great start

Wednesday 23rd May was the date, Home Retail Group HQ in CMK was the venue for the launch of the Young People are our Future project.

A group of invited guests including various departmental heads from MK council, representatives from local companies and a wonderfully diverse bunch of individuals from a wide range of backgrounds joined the YPAOF team and its founder Gary Payne at a presentation designed to inspire and motivate the local community.

Despite a beautiful evening, which could of easily became an easy distraction for many, the hospitality suite was full to the rim, bursting with enthusiasm and intrigue.

As Gary shared his vision with the group the simplicity of the project started to be appreciated by those attending. Off course, nothing is that simple and this initial response soon turned into a number of questions relating to the complexity of getting numerous local groups to work together.

The most common statement of the event was "This is very ambitious"

"Ambitious it is" said Gary. If we are going to make a real and lasting difference we need to set the bar high and attempt to positive affect the lives of thousands of local young people.

He went on to say "In every community their are the skills, enthusiasm, drive and resources to achieve some amazing things, however very rarely do people come together to tap into these unique features within the community and local people suffer as a consequence".

As a direct result of the launch, the Young People are our Future project is proud to boast a growing group of 36 volunteers (In just a few days), support from many departmental heads within the local authority and from local clubs/groups and companies.

Jurys Inn and Home Retail Group HQ were so impressed with the project and the response from those attending they increased their support by providing the facilities and resources to develop a profesional training program for the volunteers.

What next - Well YPAOF is well into phase two of its development and will be starting it volunteer training program in just three weeks time - We want a small army of volunteers to benefit from this training and are continually looking for passionate and driven people to join the team - check out http://www.youngpeopleareourfuture.org/GetInvolved.aspx

We are closing in on some potential options to provide the project with a venue for MK. With a little luck and some local kindness we are seeking to fill one of the many empty warehouse facilities within MK so that we can create a lasting community spirit within what will become the YPAOF HQ.

Local authorities and businesses have locations across the city that can easily be utilised for a great community initiative, so if you can help, get in contact.

We are launching the sponsor a child initiative in the first week of June, Where we are asking individuals and companies within the local community to donate just £3.50 to sponsor a child to experience the whole project>

1: They will receive a full life skills training course
2: They will have access to a wide variety of FREE activities across the city
3: They will experience a unique employability course designed to help young people get into work

The sponsor a child initiative is will be promoted to local companies throughout June in the hope that like VW their employees can each sponsor a child. It is hoped that the money raised through this initiative will provide not only 25,000 local young people with access to the project but will also enable us to start the project outreach work where we want to deploy the project nationwide.

If you work in a company and can are willing to represent the YPAOF project, we would love to hear from you so that we can get this great employee initiative up and running successfully.

contact gary@youngpeopleareourfuture.org

www.youngpeopleareourfuture.org

Educating, Inspiring, Motivating Young People to become the best they can be

Well, it is that time of year when the Government turns its attention to the youth related problems again in an attempt to appease the growing frustration within communities up and down the country. Or is it that they want to be seen to be doing something to stop any designs on another destructive riot.


Parental classes for everyone - Great idea until we realise that those parents who do not care for their children will never attend these classes. 


Lets get rid of ASBO's as they take too long to administer and bring in a new system, which requires 5 people to report an anti-social incident before the police step in and do something about it. Most of the people I speak to who unfortunately have to deal with anti-social behaviour around them daily might ring the Police initially but getting them to commit to a report will be very difficult as they fear intimidation and possible violence against them if they are seen to be standing up to these idiots.


I will give the people in their ivory towers respect for continually finding ways, which on paper sound so promising but in reality will not make much of a difference in the lives of those that really need change to happen.


We know that a majority of young people are good, honest, law abiding citizens who represent their communities well. We also know that it is a minority of young people who for a number of reasons have fallen onto a slippery slope that leads them to become irritants in society.


It gets under my skin, when all I here about are initiatives to enhance the opportunities of the minority and very little to encourage and reward the majority for being nice human beings.


Youth crime costs this country £1.2 billion a year and this figure is going to keep increasing.


I am a great believer that through education and concentrating on the majority, we can and will inspire the minority to appreciate the benefits of changing their habits to become decent, successful human beings.


Young People are our Future is a project that does just this. Designed to educate, inspire and motivate, this project is a cost effective solution to many of the problems young people face today.


Young people are taught some key life skills to increase their understanding of right and wrong, respect, their personal safety, communication skills and how to set and achieve goals. 


Numerous clubs / groups within the community work together to provide these young people with a wide spectrum of activities from sport to dance to singing.


Once a young person has been educated in some core values, and inspired by participating in a number of FREE local activities, they are invited to attend an employability course, where they are introduced to CV writing skills, mock interviews, presentation skills. 


If we provide this simple to deploy project to thousands of young people, those that full into the minority category will quickly appreciate the benefits of conforming as they will be surrounded by proactive, driven and excited young people. - After most intelligent human being appreciate that positivity creates positivity.


Young People are our Future is not the answer to every youth related problem in society, but it is an important part of the puzzle, which is cost effective and simple to deploy.


Find out more about this project by visiting 

www.youngpeopleareourfuture.org 

or attending a presentation at 

Home Retail Group HQ, 489 - 499 Avebury Blvd, CMK

Wednesday 23rd May - 18:00pm 

Information on the Life Skills education course can be found at www.lifeskillsforchildren.co.uk

Young People are our Future web site is launched and the project is ready to go

The Young People are our Future project is now up and running with the launch of the web site on May 1st 2012. This dynamic activity is the ultimate community project designed to educate, inspire and motivate young people with real life skills

www.youngpeopleareourfuture.org

You don't have to look far to either see images or hear stories of how the youth of today is causing local communities so many problems. Anti-social behaviour, ill discipline, no respect, massive youth unemployment.

Let's face it whilst the media is very good at pumping us with negative story after negative story, the simple facts are like in so many things it is the minority that is causing the problems for the majority.

We all know that a majority of young people are on the right tracks to growing up and becoming responsible, successful members of their communities.

What is worrying is that the minority group does seem to be getting bigger and if we are not careful will spiral out of control.

To tackle many of the youth related issues communities are experiencing the Government produced a wonderful concept called the BIG SOCIETY. Let's all work together to improve the opportunities young people have in order to become the best they can be.

Young People are our Future is the ultimate community project, which compliments the BIG SOCIETY initiative in every way possible. read on....

For the past few years I have dedicated myself to the development and deployment of a very successful life skills training course for young people. The course is designed to educate young people from 5 years + in a some practical and effective skills to increase their confidence, communication skills, ability to assess and avoid a potentially dangerous situation such as bullying and many more key skills.

I have recently set up a charity called "Young People are our Future". Together with a committee of 12 trustees representing several large companies including Jurys Inn, VW, Home Retail Group, John Lewis and Women & Work, we have developed the ultimate community project, which will initially positively affect the lives of 25,000 local young people in Milton Keynes and then will be mobilised across the country.

The project has some simple objectives:

1: Educate 25,000 young people in some real life skills
2: Provide 60 local schools with FREE life skills training
3: Develop 120 life skills coaches for the local community
4: Get 50 local clubs and groups representing a wide range of sports, music, dance, drama and art to provide FREE workshops for local young people to experience activities they would otherwise never experience
5: Provide a comprehensive employability training course to young people, where they get to learn from local professionals working within large companies

The benefits of this project are huge but the main ones to note are:

1: Young people will increase their safety and confidence
2: Young people will have access to activities they ordinarily would not have access to
3: We will reduce local anti-social behaviour statistics
4: We will reduce local business crime statistics
5: A community spirit will be developed, which will be supportive and caring

YPAOF is inviting potential volunteers to a FREE presentation we are running on May 23rd at Home Retail Group, Avebury Blvd, CMK - 18:00

WE NEED A SMALL ARMY OF VOLUNTEERS TO ASSIST IN THE DEVELOPMENT AND DELIVERY OF THIS PROJECT.

Further details on the project can be found at www.youngpeopleareourfuture.org

Inspiring Children with a Vision

Several weeks ago I attended a secondary school and was inspired to put fingers on the keyboard to create this article.

In my quest to deploy the Life Skills for Children course to as many young people as I can, I regularly meet teachers and their assistants that evoke a wide range of emotions from me. Unfortunately, most of these emotions are negative.

I am constantly questioning the reasons why some people have chosen the teaching profession to earn their living. 

As I entered the classroom to greet the group of young people that sat before me, I was pulled to one side and introduced to a teacher who would be assisting me in the delivery of the curriculum.

I paused for a moment to digest her name (Michelle) and then my brain started to work at pace to ascertain how I was going to adjust the Life Skills curriculum accordingly to accommodate an additional teacher who to my knowledge had no prior experience of the course content.

Upon asking Michelle if she had experienced any of the course material before, she gently smiled and replied in one word “No”

She then went onto explain that that group of young people in front of us both had all been assigned to her over the coming term and she was determined to create a positive relationship with them. 

What a breadth of fresh air. A teacher that realised that the most important ingredient to educating young people was to establish the right relationship from the start.

A little confused and only half convinced her statement was heartfelt, I proceeded to start the lesson and introduce my new colleague.

I decided to provide a platform for Michelle to speak about herself so that she could create the groups first impression.

I remember the exact words she used because silence fell across the classroom when they came out of her mouth.

“Good morning, Over the next few sessions I am going to get to know you, enjoy your company and together we are going to create a vision of your future that we both can work towards.”

One of the more vocal students amongst the group felt the need to utter some immature comments towards the front of the classroom. Before I could respond, Michelle had absorbed the comments, smiled and dissolved the negativity of what was said by going and sitting right next to him. 

Without confrontation, his comments had backfired as the rest of the group laughed in support of Michelle’s actions. 

At this point of the article it is relevant to note that the group of students within the course had all been identified as having serious behaviour issues which in many cases was likely to lead to permanent exclusion.

In light of this, Michelle had drawn the first of many victories I witnessed in just 4 hours of working together.

The curriculum for the first lesson involved getting the group to identify the reasons why they so disliked school and felt the need to be so disruptive.

This particular lesson within the course is normally a little hit and miss. It is not unusual to get a large percentage of the group refusing to participate in any of the written drills or open discussions. After all why would they want to expose the reasons for their negative behaviour when solutions might be found to stop giving them the excuses to carry on creating havoc.

As the lesson developed and several members of the group attempted to disrupt the class with silly comments, Michelle took the opportunity to build a better rapport with the group.

Without warning and breaking the lesson curriculum, Michelle decided to inform the group of details about her child hood, schools experiences, likes and dislikes and the poor qualifications she received in her final year of education.

The group was shell shocked and sat mouths open, eyes fixed as Michelle created an image in their minds of this out of control girl who thought school was boring and teachers hated her. 

She went onto say how her attitude at the time influenced the people she went around with outside of school and how smoking and drinking was something she regularly did on school premises.

You could see the group of students in front of her being taken on a roller coaster ride of emotion as many of them related to her experiences. Over the 15 minutes that followed, members of the group would ask questions to clarify in their minds what Michelle was saying. 

The tension and mild hostility that many members of the group had previously shown Michelle and to be fare show most of the other teachers was dissolving in front of me.

You could physically see the barriers many of the students have placed around them lifting for just enough time for them to be influenced by a vision.

By the time Michelle had finished painting a picture of her younger years, the group had moved onto more relevant questions such as “Why are you a teacher, if you hated school?” 

Michelle had the groups attention and used the small window of opportunity she had developed to install what changed her and how she developed a vision for her future.

She went on “Despite numerous people telling me to concentrate at school, be respectful and listen to your teachers, the moment that changed me was when the kids I used to hang around with who were much older than me had left school with no qualifications and spent every day out of work, drinking and smoking”.

“I realised when speaking to them that their lives were seriously boring and they had nothing to look forward to. Some of them were getting into trouble with the Police and life was pretty rubbish.”

Michelle then acknowledged that she had no reasons for behaving the way she did, She came from a loving family, was given everything she wanted. She just thought she could get away with being bad.

I remember a couple of the group members looking at each other almost accepting that they to had no real reason for their poor behaviour. 

In just a few minutes, Michelle had entered the lives of this disruptive group of young people, acknowledged their poor behaviour, identified with them and gained an important window of opportunity to install a very powerful message.

One of the group members, a young girl named Sophie asked without doubt the most important question of the lesson. “What is this Vision you keep talking about?”

Michelle took this opportunity to tell the group that she had to return to college to improve her grades and in the process met a teacher that inspired her with vision.

He asked her to list down all of the wonderful things in life that she wanted to achieve, or visit or do. With a little help and nudging, Michelle said she had developed a long list of goals, which excited her and gave her a good reason to study and behave properly.

Michelle shared some of her goals list with the group and in the process collated their opinions and dreams to start creating their own list. 

Upon being asked why she became a teacher, she replied “up until the day when I met the teacher who taught me how to create my vision of my future I was lost. He made my life make sense, and I want to do the same for somebody else”

Needless to say the scheduled curriculum for the lesson was put back to the follow day, but what I witnessed in a short period of time was the secret to teaching.

Every day of my life I talk about the importance of building rapport with students in order to create the right learning atmosphere. Michelle had taken a hardened group, excepted their current mind set and approach to life, demonstrated that she was once in their shoes and more importantly demonstrated how one moment of inspiration changed her life. 

The remainder of the Life Skills for Children course was full of as many ups and downs as every other delivery, however the relationship with Michelle was great and with a consistent approach to creating the right vision the outcome of the course was very successful.