It has been nearly a year since the Wildlife Trust BCN Young People’s Forum has been set up, and what an experience it has been! Under the guidance of Rebecca Neal, Rachel Price, and recently Laura Allen, the Young People’s Forum have been hard at work creating new opportunities for young people to not only be more involved with the local Wildlife Trust, but also to enrich a connection to nature that all young people in particular need. Through collaboration and communication, the Forum are making meaningful changes to the attitude and mind-set across all generations of the Trust across the three counties. Our first few months have been eventful to say the least, so here are the highlights:

• One of our Forum members, Nelly, spearheaded a competition with a creative focus in autumn across the three counties, working to engage primary school students on what nature means to the young people of Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and Cambridgeshire.
• A group of our dedicated Forum members volunteered at a meet-and-greet at our Bluebell Weekends in one of the precious ancient woodland areas that the Wildlife Trust BCN care for; establishing and nurturing valuable connections with local communities and setting positive role-models for young people in conservation.
• The Forum sent forward a representative to partake in planning a youth festival, uniting the youth of the Trust at events where we can work together across the counties and have a good laugh.

• A few members of the Forum have also been in touch with a local organisation to aid in tackling water pollution, which is threatening the stunning waterways of our three counties. Moving forward, we hope this collaboration will mean a dramatic shift in the health of local rivers, streams and lakes and the wildlife that calls them home; with particular interest in the complex ecosystems of chalk streams.
• Meetings are being planned with the access and interpretation manager of the Wildlife Trust BCN reserves to discuss signage, information boards and access in Wildlife Trust-managed sites, making the natural world available to all!
• New connections are being created with our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion working group, to dismantle and deconstruct the barriers to groups of young people that are preventing them from engaging with the natural world.
• A number of us even attended a training workshop on film making in tandem with the Great Fen Project. At the Forums regular meetings, we have been discussing, innovating and providing some insight, as well as practical volunteer work on reserves that the Forum do at our meetings

• Starting from the late-Autumn, pop-up Youth Rangers sessions have been ongoing across the three counties, providing opportunities for local young people to gain practical conservation skills and meet new people.
• Just a little while ago, Forum members Catherine, Callum, Alex, and Ethan presented at the Wildlife Trust BCN AGM, sharing the Forums ideas, values and visions for the future with 200 members at the conference, and a further 300 who watched online. Here, the Forum sprung to the forefront of local conservation, and displaying a generational united front to the ecological crisis.
• Our Young People’s Forum has put forward propositions for a national Wildlife Trust sub-website targeted and customised for teens and early 20’s with information relevant to us where we can post dynamic updates on what we are doing. This innovative notion is now in the hands of a new youth lead of the Wildlife Trusts umbrella organisation-we are very excited to see where this will lead.
• Lastly, the Young People’s Forum carried out an interview for the Wildlife Trust BCN’s local wildlife magazine; spreading our message to an even wider audience,

So, in just the first few months, the BCN Young People’s Forum has been making leaps and bounds in the changing of attitudes of young people in the three counties. But we are not done yet. There is still much work to do in deconstructing biases in my generation, but the Young People’s Forum are making changes right now for the better. We are incredibly excited, and are looking forward to making even more meaningful progress on our front in the fight against the planet’s ecological crisis. But we believe the future of our generation is full of hope, and that is what we are working for.

Ethan.