Lochaber Hope seeking young voices to guide grant spending

A special meeting on Monday March 24 at Fort William’s New Connections Hub will ask children aged 12-18 how an initial £200 of the award can be put towards creating a casual space for the area’s youth at the High Street location.

The Bright Minds programme, which offers workshops, training, and social events to people under the age of 25, will then allow young people to decide how the rest of the money is used in the following months in line with its ‘created by young people for young people’ philosophy.

“We want young people to take ownership of their town, and this project is their project: it would not exist without them,” said Sian McWalter, Project Worker at Lochaber Hope.

“We have got quite a few young people interested, and we just want to keep it growing and making it the best it can be for young people.”

The awarding of the money to Bright Minds is part of £3000 given to Lochaber Hope as part of Lochaber High School’s annual Youth and Philanthropy Initiative (YPI) competition, which sees S3 pupils present cases for nominated charities to receive funds from The Wood Foundation.

Pupils Anna Dodds, Dolly Clark, Matilda Service, and Lola Weir secured the top prize for Lochaber Hope at November’s event, and decided half the money should be put towards Bright Minds and the rest given to the charity’s counselling services.

“The four girls that represented us did an amazing job - they are wonderful and we would never have won it without them, said Ms McWalter,” who also thanked the school and The Wood Foundation for making YPI possible.

“They even came in during the holiday to talk to us in order to learn about Lochaber Hope and learn how counselling works. They were absolutely amazing standing up in front of the school and the judges.”