At Fitzrovia Youth in Action (FYA), the members are bringing local residents together to discuss the changes they would like to see in their neighbourhood and to empower them to make it happen. This includes anything from running workshops about improving health, writing thoughtful letters to residents during lockdown and delivering summer activity packs to people in the area.
FYA see We Make Camden as an opportunity to bring more citizens and organisations into this space – to help people’s ideas to develop and turn into local action and influence big borough-wide changes.
Food support for local people
Last May, in the middle of lockdown, FYA joined forces with the Bengali Workers Association to provide much-needed food to citizens in the area. FYA attracted over 100 volunteers and, at its peak, each week they were cooking, packing and delivering over 300 hot meals to people’s homes.
FYA would like to take this work further and meet the needs of residents beyond food to create a more connected community both online and offline.
FYA brought Christmas to people’s homes
At Christmas FYA also launched a Christmas to your Doorinitiative where 22 youth event managers, supported by 72 fantastic youth action and community volunteers found a way to impact over 1000 people and connect despite lockdown and social distancing.
Due to COVID-19, instead of people coming to their community Christmas, which normally they host every year, they wanted to bring Christmas to them and they decided to deliver hampers to our local community members.
The hampers included a meal, a series of activities and some winter socks. FYA engaged with We Make Camden by including craft kits that they hoped would encourage residents to imagine the neighbourhood of the future and introduce the mission around Camden’s vibrant and sustainable estates.
We want to hear from you
The team at FYA also rolled out a survey to assess the needs of residents and will work with the local community champions to address them.
FYA see their role in We Make Camden as an opportunity to work with more organisations to solve unmet needs and to bring citizens together to think about how the borough needs to change to tackle the root causes of the inequality which people are facing.
The community champions are a vehicle to voice issues and tackle the large inequalities that residents are facing and supporting them to raise this through the appropriate channels.
Photo credits: Fitzrovia Youth in Action
Would you like to join Fitzrovia Youth in Action?
If you are aged 8-25, get in touch via their Instagram or Twitter accounts. Or head to their website to find out how to organise events or workshops, create films and campaigns or train to be a peer mentor.
If you are over 25, then you can join FYA’s Community Champions. Or you can email the Youth Leadership Manager, Ellie, or call 07923 849277 for more information.
