By:
Patricia Thangaraj
Support young people.
This is the request that Vice President of the Barbados Youth Development Council (BYDC), Roshanna Trim, is sending out to all stakeholders, stating that the youth need this support in order to progress.
“We are asking persons to really support young persons. Not only throughout the rest of this year, but also continuing onwards, because there are a lot of youth events coming out throughout the week and there are a lot of youth organizations that have very big plans going forward so they really need a lot of support because as youth organizations, it is [not] very hard to get discouraged when you find that you are doing so much and persons are either not supporting you or you are not getting the feedback that you really need to get young people out.”
She said that this support is especially crucial when you are as young as 15 or 16 years old.
“And when you are dealing with persons that are like 15 and 16 (years old), they really need to be recognized and encouraged for what they are doing because appreciation is very good for young people and keeping them focused and committed to goals means that you have to let them know that what they are doing is worthwhile.”
Speaking on the sidelines of the Youth Expo 2016 at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre (LESC) recently, she said that this event is meant to showcase youth businesses and youth organizations and to host developmental workshops for the public, especially the youth.
She said that there are about 11 youth organizations and four youth businesses that signed up for the event and some of these are the Barbados Association of Muslim Ladies; the United Youth Leaders of Barbados; the Young Democrats; the University of the West Indies (U.W.I.) Stats; A Ganar Barbados; CARICOM Youth Ambassadors; Janix Designs, Aduke’s Art Gallery and the Caribbean Youth Environment Network (CYEN).
The age range for the members for these organizations ranges from organization to organization, but generally it is from 15 years to 25 years old with the CYEN going all the way up to 35 years old while the members for the BYDC members are from 15 years to 29 years old.
Trim said that the BYDC is the umbrella organization for all of the youth organizations in this island and these organizations are always looking for opportunities to showcase what they are about, to gain new members and to encourage young people to get involved in volunteering among other things.
Therefore, getting in touch with them and asking them to come and participate in the event was “really easy” since they do have a youth network where they are able to contact each other and collaborate.
Section: