How and when did AI UKs youth and student program begin?
Our Student programme (in AIUK’s case meaning university-based activism) started in the 1970s. We currently have over 100 student groups around the UK. Our Youth programme was set up in 1988 and refers to our work with 11-18 year olds – primarily through youth groups based in schools. We currently have around 550 youth groups in the UK. We also have a Junior Urgent Action scheme for 8-12 year olds. And in recent years, you’ve expanded your program and developed a new strategy? Before August 2004 there was one staff member coordinating both the student and youth networks which didn’t leave a lot of space for development. Since then we have been lucky enough to have a designated Student network coordinator for university-based activism and a Young People coordinator for our under 18s activism; Verity Coyle and Anne Montague respectively. This has meant that we have been able to start work on developing longer-term strategies for both these areas.
