Youth Empowerment!
It's more than just being present...
At Raise Up Youth Voice is just as important to us as leadership, we believe that each comes hand in hand and do our best to provide a variety of opportunities to be able to better connect with young people. Upskilling them in new ways and giving them the confidence to stand up for the things they care about!
We run Youth voice programmes that empower young people to speak up and be heard. Our youth advocates are taught leadership in a new light, focusing on topics that they are passionate about and forming tools to be able to make a meaningful impact.
Within Raise Up we have prefects within each of our crews, these young people are given the opportunity to lead their crews and lead by example. Prefects are about giving power back to young people in a way that supports and encourages others to reach their goals.
Raise Up is part of the YMCA and as a result, these young people get continuous opportunities to not only be part of the panel itself but also to be part of the voice that is being shared by the panel. This group is for 16-24 years olds and is a natural progression for someone of our graduated crew.
As youth workers, we believe it is important to provide training and upskilling to the next generation of youth workers. With this in mind each year we take on 2-4 interns who support crews, large scale events, youth voice opportunities and more.
Recently we have begun a youth mentoring programme, start from a need identified by our young people. As our crew members graduated from the programme we had many who wanted to stay on and continue the work Raise Up was doing. So now we can, we take 1-2 mentors pre crew each year to help continue connection and training for our young people.
Real Talk with Raise Up!
Young people from the Raise Up crews interview various guests on heaps of different topics relevant to youth. New episodes will be out soon - find them on our socials!
