Youth Champions Forum

Faith Matters Youth Forum is organising a series of conferences in three UK cities (London, Birmingham and Derby) in partnership with local partners on the theme of inclusion of young people in building community cohesion ‘ Youth CoCo’ . This project is supported by the European Commission.

Each conference is organised and led by Faith Matters Youth Forum and gives an opportunity for young people to make their voices heard as well as to meet with inspirational people: active and engaged young people, policy makers and media professionals.

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Big Society?! My Society?! Aims and Objectives:

• Engage young people with policy makers and elected members in a dialogue and discourse on how to strengthen young people’s participation in policy making, and shaping
• Promote young people’s active citizenship, and especially those with fewer life opportunities
• Make young people’s voices heard while promoting non discrimination
• Promote greater knowledge and understanding of young people and their role in supporting integration and identifying good practices around youth involvement within community cohesion programmes.
• Give young people the opportunity to take part in the development of local and national decision making processes

First Conference in  Derby:

THEME: ‘ Youth Iniatives Against Discrimination and Exclusion: Identifying Best Practices in Building Community Cohesion ‘

• Promote Young People’s Active Citizenship especially those with fewer opportunities
• Presenting Youth Initiatives against discrimination and exclusion
• Identifying good practices in building community cohesion
• Address barriers, misconceptions and prejudices between young people and policy makers

Second Conference in Birmingham :

THEME: ‘How to Include Young People in Shaping Decision Making at a Local Level’

• Debate and share good practices in engaging with local or/and national authorities
• Address Innovative approaches to local engagement and participation of young people
• Identify potential barriers  to young people’s participation in decision making and how to address them
• List and discuss Top Tips for reaching decision makers and promoting positive action

Third Conference in London:

THEME: ‘Young People in the Media: Promoting Positive Action Undertaken by Young People Through Various Media Sources’

• Discuss Top Tips for reaching media and promoting positive action
• How young people and youth organisations can display their messages in the media
• Share best practices in youth involvement with media
• Impact of the Big Society on youth initiatives: a media perspective

Please contact youth.forum@faith-matters.co.uk to be involved/take part/participate in our social media competitions and join our forum by pressing on the top left button of this page.