Youth Projects – funded through Unltd, Barrow Cadbury Trust and Comic relief awards YTA and Sports Relief

These are projects which have been created by individual young users of Voice of Aston. Who have with the help of Voice of Aston obtained funding to do their own projects; and are receiving mentoring support through each stage. This is the future of Aston and we have invested in them.

• Kabbadi by Shoib Ahmed is a full program on Kabaddi coaching, practices and a tournament. Although Kabaddi is a major part of the program it is however a vehicle through which community cohesion is delivered. Kabaddi gives young people opportunities for personal development including the development of self-discipline, self-respect and self-confidence enabling them to communicate more affectively with a range of people and work effectively in a team. The project engages with local Rugby team to show how the skills of Kabaddi can be transferred to Rugby , thus giving an opportunity for young people to learn a new sport.

• Young Workers by Hamad-Ali is to create opportunities for young people to trial jobs to get first hand experience and help them understand what it means to work; with the aim to create a young persons employment agency which offers young people opportunities to work within local businesses and for local businesses to see the potential of local young people. He hopes to encourage local businesses to invest in the local youth. This project will help young people make informed decisions regarding their futures, whilst giving them real experiences.

• Youth Party by Imran who aims to create a collection of workshops and forums for local youth to discuss politics, policy and the rights young people have in influencing their communities; culminating into a debate evening, similar to “Question Time”, with representatives from the local political parties discussing their agendas and answering young people's questions. Imran hopes that this will give youth an opportunity to make an informed choice as to who they and their families vote for ensuring they choose the right person for the area. Imran hopes to create his own youth party in the long-term to challenge local political parties

• Learning Residential by Nurul is taking 12 local youth from various ethnic and faith backgrounds on a residential to give them training and skills to become positive citizens; who can influence their peer groups and acting as ambassadors in representing their communities. The residential will be held over a 3 day period with workshops regarding issues of drugs, alcohol, violence, knives, ASBOs and training regarding mediation skills. Narul hopes he and the others can guide and advise other local youth to take a more positive choice in their lives and communities