The young people making the world a better place
COLUMNIST
THEY can get a bad press and are one of society’s most misunderstood groups, but teenagers have been in the news for their good deeds recently.
Two 14-year-olds in Cardiff were hailed as heroes this week for saving the life of a man they found bleeding to death and two Welsh 19-year-olds are in Africa helping tackle HIV/ Aids.
Just as I was reading these dramatic tales – and the first really is like a scene from Casualty but with a happy ending – an email dropped into my inbox about an 11-year-old from Rudry who has compiled a poetry anthology with friends to raise money for children affected by war and violence in Syria.
Oliver Hard is not yet a teenager, but has raised more than £200 of a £1,000 target for Save the Children which is not bad going for a budding poet.
I am sure there are many other stories and good deeds that never filter into the public domain, either because they are just every day acts of kindness by young people or because they don’t shout about them.
Youth has always been a bit threatening to older people. Even those who spend time with this alien species seem frightened, or at least a bit cautious or disapproving. The “hoody nation” of scantily-clad girls and boys whose trousers are halfway down their rears can seem exotic and off-putting if you pass a group of them on the street corner.
As a parent of three teenagers I am often tempted to stop and say: “I know all about people from your planet, so stop giving me the evil eye.”
But of course it is my paranoia and they haven’t even noticed me, let alone given me sneering looks. I am an invisible being from a place far from their orbit. Or am I? Teenagers are far more engaged with the world and current affairs than they are sometimes given credit for. Young people often have an innate sense of wanting to make the world a better, fairer place. And if they have anger management issues that may be reasonable given the current climate.
This generation of young people face an uncertain post-Brexit world where housing is priced beyond their reach, there is stifling debt for education and jobs are few and far between.
Despite all this they seem to be reasonably optimistic, and, by all accounts this week, a more caring bunch than the adults around them sometimes are. We can all say, “Oh teenagers have time to pursue their dreams and change the world, I am too busy cooking tea” but that is just an excuse.
Tea can wait – as teenagers know. That’s why they rarely turn up for it on time.
The timing of two teenagers was impeccable this week when they found an elderly man bleeding to death in Cardiff.
Jack Brown and Scott Griffin, two pupils at Bishop of Llandaff High School, were walking home after classes when they spotted Ken Goodwin lying in his garden.
Mr Goodwin, 89, had fallen from a step and hit his head against a wall, severing a major artery in his brain.
The two school boys went to his aid, calmly phoning an ambulance, before alerting Mr Goodwin’s wife Beryl, 87, who was in the house and didn’t realise her husband was injured.
The boys stayed at the scene waiting on the kerb to flag down the ambulance when it came. “We were quite nervous because there was a lot of blood, but we just tried to keep calm and rang for the ambulance,” Scott, from Fairwater, said afterwards.
Jack, who lives in Canton added: “Neither of us have ever had to do anything like this before.
“We stayed with him, rang the ambulance and got his wife, making sure he was okay.
“When the ambulance was on the way, I ran to the end of the road to wave them up the right way.”
What is wonderful about this story is not just their actions, but also that the couple very publicly thanked them. Mrs Goodwin went up to the school and described the boys as “my heroes” while her husband said: “I do think they saved my life, and I am very proud of them.”
I hope this story might help change the prevailing suspicion about teenagers – especially boys.
June Bowen Jones, an assistant head teacher at Bishop of Llandaff High School, hinted at the suspicion with which young people can be mistakenly regarded saying: “We are tremendously proud of these two boys.
“From what we understand, they acted really calmly and responsibly”, but then admitting: “When people contact us from the community we sometimes think, ‘Oh dear, what’s this going to be about? So it was wonderful to hear such positive news about two of our pupils.”
It is sad to think, but usually true, that people are quick to complain but rarely quick to flag up good experiences of young people.
So here’s another positive tale about teenagers.
Dylan Jones from Neath, and Raphael Rosin from Cardiff, are working in Zambia on a project to improve knowledge and understanding of good sexual health.
The pair are working unpaid in Zambia for three months on a Voluntary Services Overseas project to help combat the spread of sexual transmitted infections, including HIV.
More than 1.2 million Zambians currently live with HIV, and there were 20,000 AIDS-related deaths in the country last year.
This would scare many adults, but the pair are undeterred as they run sex education classes at local schools and youth groups.
They are also organising awareness raising days in the local community and training local volunteers to continue to offer information, advice and counselling about sexual health to young people when they leave.
When they return to the UK on April 9, Dylan and Raphael will work on an Action at Home project, to try and use their new skills to help local communities in south Wales.
Raphael believes everyone should try volunteering. That’s enough to humble any adult for one week. These are just a few examples but it does seem that while the grown-ups are busy making a mess of the world young people are changing lives at home and abroad.