2021

Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg were focused on the following topics in 2021:

  • Youth Resilience – Prioritising the development of skills and knowledge associated with building resilience within the individual self while also recognising the importance of building resilient communities.
  • Wicklow No Hate – taking action to develop awareness and understanding of the toxic impact of hate and exploring opportunities to pursue transformative and inclusive activities across Wicklow
  • Youth attitudes towards drugs – rolling out the Attitudes towards Drugs survey.

Mind your Mood campaign

In January, Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg laucnhed their ‘Mind your Mood’ online campaign and project with Wicklow CYPSC and other organisations as part of the ‘Keep Well’ campaign with Wicklow County Council. Keep an eye on their Facebook page here for ideas, insights, activities and inspirations about minding your mood

2020
Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg Comhairle members voted to work on the following two topics in 2020:

1. Drugs and Alcohol
2. Climate Action

Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg were busy as bees creating these messages and graphics for the return to school in September 2020.

2019

WICKLOW COMHAIRLE TO SIT ON STRATEGIC POLICY COMMITTEE  ON CLIMATE CHANGE AND BIODIVERSITY 

PRESS RELEASE: Social Democrats Cllr. Jennifer Whitmore has welcomed the inclusion of a representative from Comhairle na nÓg on Wicklow County Councils draft Strategic Policy Committee (SPC) that will deal with Climate Change and Biodiversity. Cllr. Whitmore, Chair of the SPC, proposed the move to ensure that the voice of young people in Wicklow is heard when it comes to how the Council deals with climate change and biodiversity loss.

Cllr. Whitmore said “WCC was the first county to declare a climate and biodiversity crisis, the call for which was made by children and teens across our county. Following on quickly from that declaration, WCC has established a Climate Change and Biodiversity SPC to develop and drive policy in this area. I am delighted that a representative from Comhairle na nÓg, as Wicklow’s Youth Council, will take part in the SPC. It is important that youth voices continue to play a part in these policy discussions to as it is their future that will be most impacted if we don’t get our responses to the climate crisis right.

Dermot O’Brien, Coordinator, Co. Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg, said ”The key purpose of Comhairle na nÓg is ‘to enable young people to have a voice on issues that affect them’ so we congratulate the Councillors of Wicklow County Council and the Chairperson of the Climate Change and Biodiversity SPC Cllr Whitmore for having the foresight to include for the first time a youth rep on an SPC. We will take the role and the responsibility that comes with it very seriously and look forward to making a contribution on behalf of the youth voice of Co. Wicklow. We also hope that other County Councils follow Co. Wicklow’s lead in this regard.“

The draft SPC Scheme is currently out for public consultation until Friday the 16th of August, 2019. A copy of the draft scheme is available on the Councils website, www.wicklow.ie or by emailing lgallagher@wicklowcoco.ie. The draft scheme is also available at the offices of the municipal districts at the following locations and at all Wicklow County Council public libraries.

WICKLOW COMHAIRLE WIN GARDA YOUTH AWARD

Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg are recent winners of the Garda Youth Award for Community Safety for their work on Internet Safety and Cyber Bullying. The category is to award those who have made their community a safer place to live through a crime prevention or safety initiative or innovation.

Their chosen topic to focus on in 2019 is Drugs. They will design a youth attitudes survey which will be completed by young people. A report will be produced with the survey results aimed to inform Drugs Education and Prevention in the county.

Their Safe Zone initiative will also be rolled out across the County in areas who are willing to place relevant posters in the window of their business and offer themselves as a ‘safe zone’ if a young person feels threatened or vulnerable.

News – 2018:

Members of Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg and from Clare Comhairle na nÓg were invited to present at the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Children & Youth Affairs on 7th Feb. They discussed their projects on Cyber Security & Safety for children & young people. Wicklow spoke about their cyber-bullying charter which was launched the day before on Safer Internet Day 6th Feb.

Following on from this, two Comhairle members participated in an Open Policy Debate on Online Safety in Royal Hospital Kilmainham on 8th March. You can read more about this here: 

2018

Wicklow Comhairle’s main topic for 2018 was Drugs. They carried out a mapping and info gathering process with service providers and stakeholders while at the same time developing an online survey for young people as a way of checking in on availability, access and attitudes towards drugs in Co. Wicklow.

Previous topics

Youth Homelessness :We produced amazing conversation cards ‘We need to talk about youth homelessness’ which are currently being distributed across the county in 2018.

Cyber-bullying: we developed a Cyber-bullying Charter that is current, youth led and accessible to young people and those who work with them across the County. The Charter was made into a poster which will be given to all schools and youth groups in the county. We presented this charter to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Children & Youth Affairs on 7th Feb 2018.

We hosted our #LetsGoMental2015 event in November 2015 –  see pics below. For more photos and to read more, click here:

Wicklow Comhairle na nÓg have been putting a major focus on authentic representation this year. We felt that a new emphasis was needed to reaffirm the profile of Comhairle and more importantly to rebuild a connection with the ‘voice of youth’ in Wicklow. We have strengthened our links with the decision makers in the County Council and developed an online community platform which will enable young people throughout Wicklow to engage with Comhairle in a proactive way. A Youth Survey in September will inform our AGM in 2014 and provide a strong mandate for our future work.

We also worked on the topic of Health in 2014 – in particular Sexual Health. This has been identified as a major concern, and a topic that is not dealt with in any significant sense in schools. The Comhairle set out to research the topic to ensure that they understand the topic, the problems and find out what is already in existence in terms of sexual health support structures.