The Youth Cabinet Members
announced that this meeting would be their last as they would soon
be over the eligible age for Youth Cabinet membership. They thanked
the Committee for giving Youth Cabinet representatives the
opportunity to participate at Committee to enable the voices of
young people to be heard. They went on to give the following
update:
- Make Your Mark had a
0.5% of voter turnout due to the lockdown and Youth Cabinet had
contacted schools about this via emails. The top local issue
identified was domestic violence that had never been on the ballot
before and the Youth Cabinet would consider this in the
future.
- In January, Youth
Cabinet were invited to Standing Advisory Council on Religious
Education (SACRE) to give the views of religious education from
young people’s views and how it can be improved. Youth
Cabinet would be attending more of these meetings in
future.
- The topics for
Curriculum for Life was now confirmed as Central Life Skills; Young
Thurrock Services; What is SEND?;
Criminal Exploitation; Jobs and Funky Finance. Small learning
content would be produced and sent to schools for them combine
these into lessons to enable young people to have a better learning
experience. These would be distributed via the website which was
being worked on.
- A survey about the
impact of Covid-19 on young people was undertaken and 73 responses
came back from young people between the ages of 11 – 19 years
old. 21% had felt their school provided them with effective support
during the pandemic while others expressed that schools had not
provided adequate support and sixth form colleges had better
support. Young people wanted to also see more mental health and
wellbeing related services such as mentoring, 1 to 1 support and
someone to talk to so they knew that they were not alone. Another
concern was uncertainty with the job market and had asked if
another youth employment system could be put forward. Young people
expressed their main fears to be exams; mental health; not
achieving dreams; not being provided with enough opportunities; and
that their voices were not heard.
- The Young Thurrock
Team had been providing support to young people for wellbeing and
ensuring that virtual sessions were accessible to
everybody.
The Chair questioned whether
Funky Finance taught personal finance to which the Youth Cabinet
confirmed that it did. He went on to express his support for the
Curriculum for Life.
The Committee expressed their
thanks and appreciation to the Youth Cabinet Members for their
commitment, hard work and attendance at Committee for the past two
years. The Committee wished the Youth Cabinet Members success in
their future endeavours.
Sheila Murphy questioned
whether there would be a handover period for the new Youth Cabinet
Members that would attend Committee to which the Youth Cabinet
Members confirmed that handover sessions had already
started.
The Youth Cabinet Members asked
if the service had plans for a mentoring programme and how the
school wellbeing programmes were run in Thurrock. Michele Lucas
explained that the Thurrock School Wellbeing Service was on the
Agenda for this meeting and that there was a mentoring programme
that was provided via the Inspire team. The Director of Public
Health had highlighted the importance of mentoring for young people
in a report brought to Committee last year and the mentoring
programme would be developed further.