An overview of just one team...

Full of talent, energy and spirit and that's just one of seventeen Young Advisors Chloe Newman has to offer. Led by two competent Young Advisors, Emanuel and Jacqueline are there to point us to the right direction and help keep us on track.

As Young Advisors we are called to participate in all sorts of events such as The MIX which was held at Burgess Park in August. On such events, we are there to assist the Community Wardens and ensure that the event runs smoothly. As well as assisting the Wardens, we were there to oversee the Southwark Junior Wardens and complete some Underage Drinking forms. The Junior Wardens programme was set up by Chloe Newman in February 2009 for children aged 8 - 12 and our roles are to ensure that they are kept safe at all times interact and encourage them to get involved in activities in order for them to learn some skills. This could be communication skills or anything practical such as Art, Acting, Sports etc. One of our main aims for the Junior Wardens is to help them build a positive relationship with the Police and Community Wardens and let the young people recognise that these are their friends rather than enemies.

Large events provide opportunities for us to promote the work we do and hopefully inspire young people. Since many young people turn up for these events, it gives us a chance to carry out surveys. For the Underage Drinking forms, our aim was to find out how much alcohol was being consumed illegally and not only did we carry out the questionnaire at the event but some young advisors also took some forms into their college just to make sure that we got more than we were asked.

We have a team which goes out once a week (Thursday) and patrol around hotspot areas for instance Peckham where there are issues with young people. This is called 'Street Base Team'. The patrolling is done by us Young Advisors and at least one Community Warden. The reason why Young Advisors are chosen is for the simple reason that only young people can relate to other young people and more importantly, we know how to communicate with each other. So every Thursday, from 6pm-10pm, we walk around the estates and speak to as many young people as we can to find out their views of the estate whether its good or bad and also inform them of anything taking place on the estate.

Due to our superb communication skills, we are often called to help bring young people closer to the adults and also our opinions are needed a lot of the time for example, the British Transport Police (BTP) attended on of our weekly meetings to pitch their new idea on train safety and to see how young people will react to it. Recently, we were called to assist a project on the Crawford Estate in Camberwell for the reason that the project manager had a hard time getting young people involved and therefore four Young Advisors decided to take part in a door-knocking process once a week and after the second week, we had more than the people we were looking for so this just goes to show how the help of the Southwark Young Advisors can have an excellent effect on projects.

We also have an outstanding Young man without doubt who has a bright future ahead of him and he is a Mediabox Champion. Mediabox is a DCSF fund which offers disadvantaged 13-19 year olds the opportunity to create their own media projects using print, television, film, radio or online platforms. Our Young Advisor's role is to sit on panels and help make decisions on what projects Mediabox should and shouldn't fund. Mediabox are hosting the First Light Awards in 2010 and our Young Advisor's role is to take part in the awards short-listing.

We have been receiving offers for upcoming projects due to our success and as always, we are happy to make a difference, even if it changes a small group of people. Finally, our hard work has been noticed and we have been short-listed for the Southwark Star Awards under the category 'Everyone achieving their potential' and with the help of Chloe Newman and our Leads, we are hoping changes will be made and young people will be recognised for the good work they do.