Youth Voices

In this research, we are working with schools around the country to understand how young people in Year 10 feel about social issues, and how they express their thoughts, feelings, and values on these issues inside and outside school. We’re focusing particularly on issues of race and faith equality in this study. We know that there are other important issues, like gender equality, the cost of living, and climate change. These will come up during the research too of course.

We express our feelings and ideas in multiple ways, not just words. Some feelings and ideas are difficult to capture using words alone. Below, you’ll find some of the images created by young people during the course of our research. These include images of objects that are important to young people and express their identity, values, struggles, and feelings about the world. All of them are created with young people from religiously and/or racially minoritised backgrounds.

We recognise that the research space can sometimes offer a somewhat unique place for young people in Year 10 to share things in ways that everyday pressures of preparing for exams may not. At the same time, we hope these images and narratives are inspiring to young people and their teachers and communities in their display of young people’s empathy and creativity around race and faith equality issues.

Collages

Part of the research involved workshops with young people in four different secondary schools, two of each in two English cities. After discussing issues around equality, identity inside and outside school, young people created collages to express some of their views, values and experiences. The ‘stop/start’ prompt used in some of the visuals below was inspired by the work of the AGENDA team, who have created excellent resources for engaging young people in positive relationships education and research. This included the use of ‘stop/start’ traffic light plates to engage young people in sharing messages about what they want to stop and to start in relation to relationships and sexuality education (RSE), and the equality issues associated with RSE.

We might say gender equality plays a huge role in our lives, but if we look at statistics there are only 31% CEO positions that are filled by women. In some countries females are still treated improperly. However while sexism has a greater impact one women, men may experience it also. START treating everyone EQUALLY! Start appreciating each other! Start paying everyone the amount they deserve! Start sharing, caring!

Photovoice Narratives

Prior to the workshops, the same young people worked with us by taking photos of things in their lives that are meaningful to them, and that may express their views on race, faith and/or other equality issues. We share some of these photos below, with paraphrased and quoted explanations from the young people.