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Momentum Youth Development CIC (Community Interest Company) was incorporated at Companies House on 29 August 2008. A community interest company is a new type of social enterprise company which operates on a not for profit basis. This means that any surplus funds must be re – invested back in to the company for the benefit of the community concerned. In our case this is an international online community offering network communication and residential events, specifically concerned with personal development for young people.

The company makes a report each year to the CIC Regulator at Companies House who ensures that the rules for CIC’s are being applied by the company. This ensures that all investment is reaching the places it should be going to. Momentum is set up therefore, to deliver services to young people in the most cost effective and socially responsible way available.

As directors of the company, we look forward to a future of building an effective network delivering life changing experiences for young people.

Not everyone understands the extraordinary impact that international exchanges and projects can have on individual young people. In order to make this better known, and to support our own development, we have invited 100 young people from different parts of Europe to share the stories of how their lives have changed as a result of getting out of their home environment and mixing with people from different backgrounds and cultures.

If you have a story you’d like to share with us, we’d be glad to hear from you. Simply send us an email to info@youthmomentum.org and we will send you a simple form to complete.

Over the next two months we shall start to include some of these stories on our site. Watch this space!

In January & May 2007 members of the Momentum team took on an exciting project working with 20 young Ethiopians. Our challenge was to train and then introduce them to a team of the top Ethiopian film directors who then mentored them in film making skills. The aim was to make 4 films about the Ethiopian Millenium which was the last country in the world to celebrate this (7 years after us!). The project enabled us to take one of the more experienced young people who had worked on our programmes. The images below show the young people going through the training phase.

www.shoeboxfilm.org.uk

In the “Dead Area” of Belarus (an area effected by the aftermath of the Chenobyl nuclear disaster) 1000’s of children are being attacked on a daily basis by an invisible enemy called radiation. Support and medical assistance is basic or non-existent, do we stand by and let this happen or do we give them some hope and support.

In December 2006 our team visited Belarus to film the distribution of Smaritans Purse Shoeboxes, we weren’t prepared for what we found once we got there. Visit this website www.shoeboxfilm.org.uk to find out more.

After raising over £5000 for the projects we visited in Belarus we wanted to create some long term projects with a relatively small amount of money. We linked into the Charity One Child One World. They will help facilitate and oversee 5 local projects these are:

1 x Agricultural project (purchasing of trees to be planted in an appropriate project)
1 x special needs project linking with a UK Special Needs School
1 x scholarship type project (supporting an outstanding individual)
1 x youth type project (internet café)

Steve Whaley is the Director of this charity and here he is explaining more about it :-

“OneChild OneWorld is a relatively new ‘not for profit’ charitable organisation which was set up in April of this year. The main aim of the organisation is to give the opportunity for groups of people in the UK to establish a link with similar groups in Eastern Europe.

Although the organisation is new, its founder, Steve Whaley, has 11 years experience of working in the humanitarian sector both in the UK and overseas.

We have 2 simple projects which are designed to make it very easy to get involved in our work.

Both are primarily aimed towards schools but can be adopted by any group. We have an Education Pack Scheme and a Gift Box Scheme. Basically, donors fill one of these packs and we deliver them to children in the FSU country of Belarus.

After delivery, the recipient group will contact the donating group to let them know their gifts have arrived. It is also our hope that some dialogue will continue between the groups.

In the case of schools we are also trying to encourage them to consider an accompanied field trip. These elements are beneficial to each group, donors and recipients as it gives an opportunity for cultural exchange.

We also give the opportunity for a group to take on a project which will benefit either a group or even an entire community. These projects will be achievable goals. For example they will cost around £1000 – £2000. The idea is that the project will be ‘owned’ from start to finish by the donating group. They will raise funds, they will be informed on progress, and they can, if they wish self fund a trip to see how the project is going on. If you need any more information visit us at www.onechildoneworld.org.uk” Steve Whaley Director One Child One World.

www.cre8ive8.org

Cre8ive8 is a youth media production that brings together film enthusiasts aged 15-27.
The Cre8ive8 team encompasses young talented people who use film and media as tools to express their ideas and reach other young people worldwide.

The mission of Cre8ive8 is to inspire and empower young people and, thus, encourage them to promote their voice and make a difference in their and other people’s lives by using film and various multimedia forms. Most importantly, Cre8ive8 is something you most definitely want to.

In 2003 one of the Momentum Directors (Paul Oxborough) was commissioned to work in Macedonia. His job was to teach a team of 5 young people film making skills. The project was funded by the British Council who not only paid for the training they also provided some state of the art film making equipment. After the training a series of short films were created by Cre8ive8 and one of them was submitted to a UNICEF International Film Festival alongside over 300 other films from 75 countries.

It was an amazing day when the judges announced Cre8ive8 the overall winners. This was the start for C8. Now a few years on they have gone from a small group of enthusiastic young people to a highly motivated team of film specialists. They have a team of approx. 25 and are now an NGO running their own affairs.

This is one of their more recent films, it is called Balkan Cage and it explores the feelings of being trapped inside a country in which few people ever leave because of the dreadful visa situation

Fit & Green. Cre8ive8 were commissioned to make this film about a recent project promoting outdoor education for young people. Four countries took part. The project was funded by the EU Youth in Action Programme and directed by Andrew Hadley (Momentum Chief Exec) in partnership with Go Away and Learn.

The film below is a promotional film for one our summer schools.
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Momentum feels very privileged to have supported Cre8ive8 from the very beginning and continues to believe in the work they do. The clip was a weekend challenge thrown out to the group to produce a public service film that others could learn something from. The theme was finding the correct use for condoms … please enjoy

The Blue Sky international summer school was a flag ship event developed by another one of our Directors (Andrew Hadley) more on this later. This film by Cre8ive8 shows the ending of a powerful 10 day experience …

One of the great experiences when working on programmes like this is the obvious growth in maturity and tolerance towards others. The film below explored the theme of tolerance and understanding across cultures and religions and was a very moving experience

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Cre8ive8 staff are all young people, who work to train other young people film making skills. The all speak fluent English and are available to deliver inspiration film events and training. If you wish to contact them visit www.cre8ive8.org

The following film involved a large amount of countries coming together to share common themes across Europe, this is the South East Europe Youth Furum – Youth Action Week, please enjoy

In 2008 Paul Oxborough was asked to document and support an huge enterprise programme for young people in Sheffield involving 22 schools. It led to an international trip to Boston USA and a exclusive visit to Harvard Business School. The project was called the Big Challenge (www.bigchallenge.biz)

The aim was to encourage young people to create small businesses and raise money for charity over a 3 month period. Paul’s job was to train up some young people to help document the project. This film was created for the awards ceremony and shown in front of 400 people. It involved 12 schools and over 90 young people in it’s production

The winning team in 2008 was a group of seven 14-15 year old girls who developed a jewelry business. They won over £22,000 for their school and a 5 star trip to Boston USA. This is the film Paul made with the girls following this trip (it is in two parts)

Part 2 is below

This is a project we supported based in Sheffield as part of the www.bigchallenge.biz initiative. The film below gives you more information about the Big Challenge.

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