Hackney Youth Parliament - Young Hackney

Message from Hackney Youth Parliament 2010-2012Hackney Youth Parliament would like to tell you aboutsome of the work we’ve been doing over the last twoyears in our role as representatives of young people inborough.Although two years sounds like a long time, when youbecome part of a team, the time flies by, and it’s allbeen fun. At first we were all very shy but very excitedabout starting this journey together. We all camefrom different backgrounds but came together for thegood of the youth of Hackney.We each were elected to represent one of the fourneighbourhoods in Hackney; North East, Shoreditch,Homerton or Stoke Newington but we all had acommon goal. We’ve thrived in this role and done ourbest to be involved in youth politics and democracy asevery decision made by the council effects all of us inone way or another, and it is important that we havea say in the decisions that affect our lives.Our first aim was to get to know each other andselect our new Chair, Vice-chair, Secretary andCommunication Officers – and where better to dothis than the Kingswood Residential Centre. A littlebit of team-building; archery, go-karting, climbingand jumping off towers, alongside debating andcoming up with ideas for our yearly conference andcampaigns. It was a great way for everyone to unwindand feel relaxed with each other whilst makingproductive choices about the future direction ofthe Parliament.Once back in Hackney we began preparations forour consultations with young people. We carried outwide-reaching consultations and were able to drawout the top concerns of local young people. Our firstcampaign was called Exam Stress. This focused onstudents in year 10 and 11 who were soon to sittheir GCSE examinations. We went to many differentschools, from Mossbourne Community Academyto Cardinal Pole to Haggerston and gave advice tostudents about relaxation techniques to help calmthemselves down in the lead up to exams, with helpfulexam revision tips too.4