“It was great to be a part of something young people created to help other young people. It made me feel proud to be able to spread awareness about such an important topic.” Isla, 17
On National Child Exploitation Awareness Day, we celebrate the invaluable contribution of young people from Slough to a nationwide campaign tackling county lines exploitation. This initiative, spearheaded by UK Youth and Stop the Traffik and funded by Burger King, aims to raise awareness of child criminal exploitation in key hotspot areas. Working in collaboration with Together As One in Slough and United Youth Alliance in Blackpool, groups of young people played a pivotal role in developing the campaign materials that have since been widely disseminated.
The campaign provided young people with a dedicated online platform where they could access further information. Since its launch, the campaign has achieved remarkable reach and impact:
383,688 young people across England have been engaged in raising awareness about county lines.
54.5% of respondents reported that the campaign made them realise they, or someone they know, might be at risk of exploitation.
3,131 individuals watched at least half of the campaign video.
5.02% of those who viewed the advert clicked on the ‘learn more’ button to explore further resources.
What is County Lines?
County Lines refers to the practice of organised criminal networks and gangs transporting illegal drugs across different regions, often exploiting children and vulnerable individuals in the process. Those targeted are frequently subjected to coercion, intimidation, and violence, sometimes involving weapons. The illicit activity typically spans police and local authority boundaries, though not exclusively.
Recruitment can take place in person or online. Young people are often approached in locations such as fast-food restaurants, shopping centres, parks, outside their homes, or on their way to school. Increasingly, social media platforms such as TikTok, Snapchat, and online gaming forums serve as digital spaces where young people are groomed and exploited.
Designing the Campaign
Over two days, young people in Slough took part in a structured creative process to develop their campaign materials. They began by exploring the idea of vulnerability, reflecting on their own experiences to understand how and why young people can be at risk of exploitation. Building on this, they identified key groups they wanted to reach, considering factors such as age, gender, and background.
Young people’s views on vulnerability
To ensure their campaign met the needs of these audiences, they outlined the specific challenges young people face in relation to county lines, grooming, and exploitation. From there, they discussed the most important messages to share, focusing on raising awareness and highlighting the risks of criminal exploitation.
With these foundations in place, they moved on to designing the campaign itself. Drawing inspiration from social media trends, they developed creative ideas that would appeal to their peers. They then produced digital materials, including videos and social media content, to maximise engagement. After testing their work within their peer groups, they refined the content based on feedback.
Finally, they contributed to the development of a website to serve as an online hub, offering information and resources for those seeking help or advice. The campaign website can be found here: County Lines Campaign 2024 | STOP THE TRAFFIK
The young people’s prototypes
One of the most striking aspects of the campaign was the young people’s innovative approach to content creation. They leveraged an emerging internet trend—one that initially baffled older professionals but has proven highly effective. Their method involved overlaying a voiceover narrative onto video game footage or similarly engaging visual content. Research suggests that retention rates for stories accompanied by unrelated but visually stimulating material are significantly higher. The young people demonstrated exceptional creativity, and their final campaign assets really closely resembled their original prototypes.
We are immensely proud of the young people involved in this project. Their ability to shape a campaign that has reached hundreds of thousands of their peers is a testament to their insight and determination. One of the most impressive elements of their work was their nuanced understanding of vulnerability. In a brainstorming session, they identified 41 distinct factors contributing to vulnerability, demonstrating a depth of awareness that can only come from lived experience. Their contribution has been invaluable in ensuring that this campaign speaks directly to those who need it most.
Together As One
Together As One was established over 25 years ago in Slough due to gang tensions. Ever since then, participation has been at the heart of what we do, making TAO a natural choice for UK Youth and Stop the Traffik when they were searching for locally embedded organisations to really capture the views of young people. We began with a quote from a young person on the project – we will finish with one too. Here’s Mohammed (16):
I knew deep inside that this was all for a great cause and that it deserved my full efforts and responsibility. The people I met, the work – we all had a share in – and the experiences we gathered, was truly amazing. I pray that what we have done can resonate and bring about a positive impact on even more young people in the country who may be exposed to county lines: that this may be their ticket to escaping from their silent suffering. I’m extremely grateful for the sheer amount of people we’ve reached and for the opportunity I’ve been given.
If you were to ask someone what Global Grub involves who had no prior knowledge of the project, they might correctly guess it involves food from different cultures. Less obvious is the project’s link to mental health, but a desire to deliver proactive work on mental health motivated the creation of Global Grub. As the title suggests, we also believe the project is a fine example of youth participation.
The Mental Health Connection
Mental Health Awareness Week, May 2021, we challenged the young people accessing our services to design a project based on the Five Ways to Wellbeing. The ‘Five Ways’ are five things that everyone can do to strengthen their mental wellbeing. In a way, this was partly an academic exercise: it’s main objective, to see if the young people understood the ‘Five Ways’ framework.
The young people presented their ideas to each other, and one stood out above all others – not least because the other young people in attendance also thought it was brilliant. Their idea was to learn to cook food from different cultures during the summer holidays – a time when many felt their mental health was at its lowest due to social isolation. They suggested a cooking project would help them to Connect with other people. By cooking food from different cultures, the young people would be Learning, and finally, through exposure to new dishes, they would be more Mindful due to a raised awareness of new flavours and scents. As the project has evolved, we have integrated new ad hoc ways of learning, for example this month (Easter ’24), the young people have the opportunity to learn to DJ and paint henna. An additional ‘way to wellbeing’ has also been integrated via being active: for example, this month, team games like dodgeball have also been integrated into the programme. In keeping with the broader ethos of Global Grub, these are young people’s ideas.
Participation
As must have been clear by now, youth voice was at the forefront of this project’s development. Building on the initial excitement from that first week when the young people had conceived the idea for Global Grub, we spent the following weeks both listening to the young people’s ideas so that they could shape the project (for example it was in one of those sessions that they came up with the name “Global Grub”), but also training the young people in skills so that they could assist with the search for funding to actually get the project off the ground.
Youth voice and participation has been at the forefront of the continued development of the project and has led to some special twists on its delivery, such as retiming the cooking sessions to coincide with Iftar during Ramadan. Other, modifications have included Global Grub picnics, where we take the food to the park and the young people assemble it themselves, making wraps and salads.
Another area of the project that young people have led is promotion. We have found the most effective approach is for young people to record pieces ‘talking to the camera’ promoting what is going to happen. These clips are then shared on range of social media platforms. Not only does this promote the project, but it also supports new skills development for the young people involved.
Funding
The young people had a vision for the project in May, but where could we find funding? Their idea coincided with the launch of an NHS Innovation Fund and Frimley ICB awarded the project £5,000. Meanwhile, Marcus Rashford successfully campaigned for young people entitled to Free School Meals to have similar rights during school holidays. The opportunities presented by these two funding streams allowed us to deliver our first Global Grub in July and August of that year. In subsequent years, the HAF Fund has been a vital source of funding, as has been generous donations from Stoke Park.
Key Ingredients
As is so often the case with youth work projects, the right staff are integral to the successful running of the project. Kevin Muhammad has been key to the success of the project. Kevin cut his teeth in a range of commercial kitchens before starting to run his own courses and he later became a home economics teacher at Windsor Boys’ School. Kevin has a fantastic rapport with the young people accessing our services. Finding any teacher who could teach the young people was challenging – most are looking forward to their holidays, when Global Grub takes place – so to find one with Kevin’s qualities was an astounding piece of luck.
Kevin has been ably supported by our youth workers and have spent enough time with Kevin that though he is unable to join us this Easter, they have learned enough from him to ‘hold the fort.’ This would have been unthinkable a couple of years ago and highlights how much he has built our capacity. Indeed, in December 2021, we were faced with that very challenge as Kevin tested positive for COVID on the eve of four days of Global Grub. Thankfully at this point we had 19 months experience of online youth work. We simply dropped off the ingredients at the young people’s homes and met them online, where Kevin felt well enough to instruct them how to cook on Zoom.
Another key ingredient of the project is a venue. This has not always been the easiest aspect of the project. Initially we put a makeshift kitchen into the YES Shop – a pop up venue in the local shopping centre. The venue was ideal for us – centrally located, with a recreation room off the main kitchen for activities. When the Queensmere shut this side of the shopping centre we needed to look further afield. We relocated to Weekes Drive Community Centre in Cippenham. This took us away from the centre but was an easier location for pick-ups and drop offs. It was also prohibitively expensive. It led us to our latest destination in Kedermister Park, Langley, a venue owned by the Guides. The venue has a sizeable kitchen and a decent sized hall we can use for various activities. The park has a reputation for violence and antisocial behaviour so there is also a sense that we are in the right location, to bring something positive to an area which needs it.
Equipment
We have a lot of equipment, and this is an ingredient which cannot be underestimated. The key reason for this, is that if the project was simply about giving the young people food, a few industrial sized pans would have sufficed. But the project has always sought to ensure the young people can reproduce the dishes at home, and if they were only familiar with, for example, making a small contribution to an industrial process, they couldn’t recreate the recipes. Instead, every young person goes through all the steps themselves, and if that means that seven young people are cooking at the same time and it’s a recipe requiring two pans, we need fourteen pans in total. It is easy to see how an abundance of equipment is important.
The Recipes
Global Grub is run during the school holidays in Easter (one week), Summer (four weeks) and Christmas (one week). The dishes are determined in consultation with young people. They create a long list and Kevin, Sanna and Aida establish what can be achieved in a one-hour cooking session.
We had intended to create a cookbook for the young people, of the recipes they created. However, the young people told us quite directly that any such books would gather dust and not be looked at. Rather, they advocated for the creation of TikToks which would allow the young people to remember and follow the recipes in future, in a much more interesting way. At the time of writing, Global Grub recipes have attracted over a thousand views!
Famous Supporters and Royal Participation
As noted above, the project was no stranger to leveraging to power of social media, most significantly with promotional work on YouTube and recipes on TikTok. We also used Instagram, Facebook, and X to advertise the project. Marcus Rashford made one of our Global Grub tweets our most shared tweet ever when he retweeted it from his official account, resulting in over 230,000 views. Even more impressively, in January 2023, HRH Prince William visited Together As One to learn more about our work and took part in a Global Grub cooking session.
HRH Prince William gets involved in Global Grub cooking with Inaaya and Daisha.
Views of Third Parties
Donna Sheldon visited Global Grub on behalf of the Department for Education in August 2023. We were delighted she took the time to really engage with the young people and joined us for some food. She was impressed with that she saw and invited Together As One to be a part of a best practice Bite Size Learning clip for HAF Providers. The clip can be seen below with the focus on Slough from 12:48:
Participation
Global Grub pre-dates our move to the fantastic Upshot system, which analyses data so straightforwardly for us. However, we can take 2023 as a snapshot to give readers an understanding of the scale of young people’s involvement and the diversity of the young people who have chosen to get involved. 128 young people took part in Global Grub. The average age of the participants was 14. The young people were from six different faiths and eighteen different ethnicities. 32 of the young people indicated they had SEND or a mental health condition.
At any given time, we struggle to exceed 7 or 8 young people in the kitchen. The optimum number of participants is probably slightly fewer at 5 or 6. The project has grown in popularity and though the young people who initially conceived the idea have started to move on, the new young people have shown a fantastic appetite for it to continue.
Evaluation
During the first Global Grub we asked young people to rate themselves against these key questions:
How would you rate…
your ability to cook different dishes?
knowledge of different cultures?
knowledge of nutrition?
confidence in communicating with people you don’t know?
We also used the Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale to try to gain an understand of the project’s impact on mental health. Across the four areas outlined above and all but two of the areas covered in WEMWBS, the young people attested to an improvement.
Key Ingredients
Spaces for youth voice to inform project development.
Staff who are able to draw on youth work skills, as well as food technology
A spacious kitchen preferably with multiple ovens/hobs.
Plenty of equipment – the kinds of which you might find in your own home, rather than large commercial pans.
Today marks a significant occasion, long-awaited and carefully prepared for! A group of young people from Slough are embarking on a journey to Ley Hill Cricket Club, eager to begin their education in the art of beekeeping.
But how did we reach this point? The British Science Association (BSA), along with the University of Reading and Slough CVS, extended invitations to community groups and charities in Slough and Reading. These groups primarily serve communities that are either new to research or typically underrepresented in such endeavours, inviting them to participate in a Community Led Research Pilot.
Initial discussions between the young volunteers of Together As One (Aik Saath) and representatives from the University of Reading and SCVS revealed a strong interest among the young people in the natural world and environmental issues. Some were concerned about climate change, while others were eager to contribute more to environmental causes.
Throughout the summer of 2023, the young volunteers participated in a diverse array of environmental activities, including upcycling clothing, canal cleaning, and learning about bat conservation and beekeeping. Among these activities, the beekeeping session emerged as a favourite among the young people. Their feedback indicated a strong enjoyment of all sessions, with beekeeping being the preferred pursuit to carry forward.
So, what came next? The university recognized the value of the young people’s journey, and due to the success of the initial exploratory projects, a decision was made to delve deeper. It became apparent from the outset that engagement in environmental activities could benefit the young people, and beekeeping was a subject they wished to explore further.
After successfully reapplying to the BSA, the project was selected to explore the impact of beekeeping on young people’s mental health. The search began for a beekeeping club or society willing to offer support. Several societies were contacted, and one, Chalfonts Beekeepers’ Society, enthusiastically offered their assistance. Their President, Sarah Peterson, has been supportive from the outset, and the society has generously collaborated to develop a training program for the young people.
While bees play a vital role in humanity’s survival, they aren’t always viewed positively. Securing accessible land willing to host a hive posed challenges. However, a pocket park next to Cocksherd Woods in Britwell has been identified as the ideal site. The volunteer-led site has everything a hive might need, including security, level surfaces and access to water via a pond (not essential but most welcome). Moreover, this initiative has the potential to contribute to broader initiatives aimed at making Slough more hospitable to wildlife, facilitated by the newly established Green Slough Community Development Trust.
Meanwhile, the university introduced the project team to Prof. Ciara McCabe, a renowned academic in mental health research, and her doctoral student, Sena Demir Kassem. They lead the research aspect of the project, focusing on mental health. Additionally, the project team is gaining valuable insights from them into the research process undertaken by universities and how to collaborate effectively with higher education institutions.
In this SEND Youth Forum session, the young people discussed mental health. The discussion started around why young people with SEND may be more likely to have mental health challenges than their peers and how mental health and SEND intersect. The young people shared a range of responses from some of their personal experiences to what their peers have felt.
How we feel…
Low self-esteem and low self-confidence were recognised by the group as some of the more common experiences that a young person may have because of a negative view of themselves and their diagnosis. Some young people with SEND have negative feelings linked to feeling ‘different’ or having different needs to their peers. As a result the young people can feel socially excluded and can have challenges building and maintaining friendships. This may cause them to feel left out and can result in feelings of depression and anxiety.
Masking
Many young people may use masking as a coping strategy in their day-to-day life such as at school or in college. Masking is when someone disguises parts of their character to fit in better, this can include mimicking others. This can have a harmful effect on mental health as it is often exhausting and can result in feeling ‘burnt out’.
Feeling overwhelmed
Another theme that was highlighted was feeling overwhelmed in school by both academic pressures and behavioural expectations. There are instances of young people feeling as if they are expected to work at a standard that they feel is unattainable and when the young people internalise these pressures it negatively impacts them. Particularly when they feel the school or college is not providing them with accommodations that can help them feel like these goals are in reach so they feel more motivated to work towards them.
Furthermore, both young people and parents have emphasised that some young people do not have positive relationships with school staff and that they sometimes feel labelled by their teachers. When a young person is called out by staff or asked to leave the classroom repeatedly they can start to feel excluded from their peers. Particularly when a young person spends less time in the classroom due to internal/ external exclusions or a reduced timetable this can amplify the feelings of social exclusion and feeling left out. This results in them experiencing feelings of social anxiety and nervousness when they re-join the class.
Each child with SEND has a unique and distinct experience and it is important to consider how their diagnosis can influence their mental health and how they are supported to overcome some of these challenges in different environments.
Need support?
If you are concerned about your mental health or the mental health of another person, there is a useful list of services here.
If you are interested to learn more about the lived experiences of young people with SEND in Slough please contact Jovi 07709525687 or [email protected] .
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