The Positive Steps to Wellbeing group is made up of a range of young people from North Lincolnshire Schools and Colleges. It is a diverse group which includes young people with SEND and Looked After Children. The group meet together on a bi-monthly basis to discuss emotional health and wellbeing topics and how they can support their peers. The Chair and Vice-chair of the group are both young people. They set the agenda and chair the meetings.
The Positive Steps to Wellbeing group is made up of a range of young people from North Lincolnshire Schools and Colleges. It is a diverse group which includes young people with SEND and Looked After Children. The group meet together on a bi-monthly basis to discuss emotional health and wellbeing topics and how they can support their peers. The Chair and Vice-chair of the group are both young people. They set the agenda and chair the meetings.
The group started as a spin-off from the very popular Be Unique Body Image group. As the Be Unique group developed the young people quickly realised that they and their peers needed to tackle some of the stigma surrounding mental health. Three of the founder members of Positive Steps to Wellbeing went on a Youth Mental Health First Aid course. They then convened a training to share the knowledge gained and discuss how young people could start to break down the barriers and stigma associated with youth mental health. The Positive Steps to Wellbeing group was born.
The group decided to develop a leaflet called Positive Steps. They looked at the adult version of 5 steps to wellbeing and developed a teenage friendly version. In order to market this to their peers they started a facebook page Tri-Positive and organised an event on a Saturday in the centre of Scunthorpe. Despite the appalling weather the event was a success, attracting over 400 people.
The Positive Steps leaflet attracted a lot of interest from both young people and the adults whom supported them. The group were asked if they would consider further projects, linked to the leaflet, to continue to breakdown the stigma associated with mental health. This has included speaking at 2 North Lincolnshire children’s conferences about mental health (to approx 300 young people), running workshops at North Lincolnshire Council events and, most recently, hosting a workshop for local mental health services (children and adults.)
Whilst they were happy with the leaflet a discussion ensued about the Facebook page. It was receiving a small amount of traffic but the group decided they could do better. Part of the group started to research other websites available to teens and how they were used. The group then put a proposal together to North Lincs Public Health team to develop a website by young people for young people and Life Central was born.
At the same time another group from a local Secondary School decided to put the words from the Positive Steps leaflet into a song. Supported by a local musician each year group took one of the positive steps and created a verse for the song. The version was brought back to the Positive Steps group and edited before being finally recorded. This is now known as the Create the Change song.
Positive Steps to wellbeing leaflet – This is now used on all North Lincolnshire schools peer mentor training as a tool for young people to support their peers with mental health and emotional wellbeing issues. The young people have also recently developed a fortune teller origami resource which can be used as a shorter version with pre-teens. The leaflet is also available at mental health services (both adult and children’s) and in community buildings such as Children’s Centres, Wellbeing hubs, Doctors, sports centres, libraries etc. Teenagers and adults who pick up the leaflet are encouraged to think of an activity for one of the positive steps then take a step and try and fit in into their lives to improve their emotional wellbeing.
Create the Change song – This has gone viral! The Create the Change song has impactful words that helps the listener reflect on what they could do differently. It offers reassurance that “You are not alone” which was one of the key messages that the group really wanted to get across to teens as they felt that having poor mental health as a teenager can feel very isolating. The song is very powerful and comments on the You Tube page have focussed on how positive and reassuring the song is.
Life Central – The newest project of the group. This is growing in size as the group is growing in confidence. Peer mentors in North Lincs schools and colleges use this as a ‘go to’ resource when supporting others and have collaborated with the group to write the content. It is still a small website but is starting to be noticed and used by young people outside as well as inside North Lincs.
The main aim of the group has always been to reduce the stigma of poor mental health and find ways to start the conversation with peers about how they are feeling and how they can improve their emotional health and wellbeing. The groups mantra is “By young people, for young people.” We are all really excited to see what they think of next!
