TEENAGERS get a bad press these days.

Research by pollsters Mori reveals that 71 per cent of articles written about young people are negative, while only 14 per cent are positive.

To us on the Teen team it appears the media tends to highlight most of the negative, almost promoting the bad things among the young people, and not necessarily talking about all the good we do.

Because we can hang around in groups we can look scary . We understand that some young people do get into trouble — just like some adults do — but it only takes a small minority of us do something wrong for young people in general get criticised by the media, who talk about "yobs" and "thugs".

Teenagers are portrayed as hanging out on street corners drinking and getting up to no good.

The Echo, Devon Youth Service area youth worker and project leader Amy Bickford and John Man, team leader of the Exeter 100 Club in Wear Barton Road, got together to try and change the negative view of young people.

And we were really pleased when the Echo came up with the idea of awards to promote positive images of young people, showing the good things that they do and combating the negative stereotypes.

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Amy has worked really hard on the project to keep the momentum going.

We know that there are lots of young people out there who have done good things for their communities, the environment and other people, or who have shown amazing skills in the arts, sports or education.

These awards are for young people aged 13 to 19 who now have the chance to remind people that we aren't all bad.

We hope the rewards will be an inspiration to other young people and make them feel appreciated for all the good things that they do.

We think that once people feel appreciated they will want to promote all the good things they do within their own communities and encourage more young people to do the same.

So please nominate people that you know; tell your friends and family — let's show everyone the great things that we all do

Amy Bickford said: "When the Echo approached Devon Youth Service Exeter with the idea of a weekly page written by, and for young people, team leader John Man jumped at the idea. Following a meeting with the Echo's editor, Marc Astley, it was decided that we would ask young people to join a group which would be involved in developing the page.

"Some young people came forward who were keen to participate. The group currently has six regular members who produce the main article as well as other young people who contribute comments."

The Teen team meets Amy every two weeks at Buddle Lane youth centre. At the meeting they discuss ideas for articles, look through newspapers and magazines to highlight articles of interest to young people. Young people also use this time to write the main articles for the page.

Amy said: "I am really impressed that the Express &Echo has handed over control of the page to the young people. I believe that young people have important things to say and deserve the opportunity to show that they have opinions which should be taken notice of."

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