It has been a very busy start to 2010 for the Damilola Taylor Trust so apologies for the gap in between blogs. I have been snowed under with more than just snow!
We have launched a new anti youth violence campaign called COUNT ME IN – TOGETHER WE CAN STOP KNIFE CRIME.
The project was launched by our family collective FAMILIES UTD on Monday 15th March 2010 when the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and the Minister for Schools joined the families at Lillian Baylis School in Kennington South London to talk to the pupils about the campaign.
Here is a video of the first day launch
The campaign has been developed so that it can grow organically and evolve as the membership gathers momentum – This first phase of activity for the launch saw the families of Robert Knox, Damilola Taylor, Ben Kinsella, David Idowu and Jimmy Mizen come together to tell their tragic stories and in doing so call for young people to stand behind them in condemning knife crime. after the first visit the families crossed London to visit a school in Haringey before Richard Taylor and Brooke Kinsella set off on a week long tour of schools around the Country.
The launch was a huge success with 30,000 people joining the Facebook group page in the first week. The Facebook page is being used as the sign post and meeting point for the campaign and Facebook themselves have been hugely supportive with some free ads and helpful training for the young people who are acting as administrators for the page.
The next phase of activity with the campaign which now has 36,000 active members attached is that we have joined forces with the Young Advisor’s charity and are now embarking on the development of the campaign by having young people shape and mould it as a force for good. The intention is to create a positive youth MOVEMENT by targeting the positive majority who are not involved with gangs and would never be so stupid as to carry a knife in the first place. Creating a huge swell of positive peer pressure is the immediate goal – Young people such as those who were nominated for the inaugural Spirit of London Awards last Year are the future of London and the largest percentage of them want nothing to do with the negative culture of the knife, gun or gang.
Families Utd will continue to support the campaign with more school visits and events being planned and Brooke Kinsella will remain its figurehead. Young people will POWER its development now though as we believe that destiny is a self – fulfilling prophecy!
On to the subject of Spirit of London Awards 2010 and last week we visited our great friend Mayor Boris at City Hall so that he could present certificates of achievement to last years category runners up
The video link is courtesy of achievement through music winner Mariamba Samba
The mayor is a huge fan of the project of course and we now hope to work with him more cohesively as we work towards this Years event but also of course with one eye firmly on 2012.
The Damilola Taylor Trust is dedicated to seeing youth crime eradicated and our streets reclaimed for the innocent and positive majority – Celebrating the positive majority and giving them the spotlight and headlines they deserve is the way we feel that we can best serve our purpose. Our young people are counting on us and we in turn are counting on them!
The Spirit of London Awards nominations for 2010 will launch through our media partners in June this Year and I am really pleased to say that the Sun are supporting us again this Year so be ready to start nominating!
Until our paths cross again shortly – Make sure to sign up to the COUNT ME IN campaign if you have not already done, click the logo above and then click like on Facebook. (Don’t forget to invite your friends as well).
May the Spirit of London be strong in you!
Gary Trowsdale
DAMILOLA TAYLOR TRUST
