Blog on the Frog

Latest posting from our Leicester colleagues at Warning Zone:

As reported last month, a major piece of work has been the shooting of a new briefing film to be shown to visiting groups on their arrival at WZ.  The film sets the scene for everything that follows during their two hour visit and was made possible by funding from the Wooden Spoon charity.  Filming started on Saturday 27th July and continued in the following week.  Poor weather on the Wednesday forced an extra day filming on Thursday when finally, the director/cameraman was able to call, “That’s a wrap”.  Thanks all round to Nutmeg 3D, the adult actors, the chaperones, those providing locations but not least to our six leading cast members, former Year 6 pupils from Wolsey House Primary School, Beaumont Leys Lane in Leicester: they were great.  The film will be ready for use at the start of the new school year.

Warning Zone is supporting National Citizens Service programme this summer. Six hundred 16/17 year olds from Leicester, Leicestershire & Rutland will be participating. As part of this programme the youngsters need to volunteer in their local community to make a difference. We offered a WZ fundraising project.

We obviously struck a chord as we were the first project to be chosen.  Eleven young people have started working at WZ this week and are planning their activities under the guidance of Ben, our De Montfort Uni student intern (well, he’s the closest we have to a young person on our staff).  Next week they put their plans into action; look out Leicester!

Our Wednesday Open Day Drop-in events continue with people from a wide range of organisations and businesses visiting us to find out more about the charity, the centre and what they can do to help.  Already these have opened up some interesting possibilities for partnerships and funding.

Finally, our utmost sympathy goes out to the family and friends of 14 year old Hannah Smith of Lutterworth who took her own life last week, apparently after being subjected to online bullying and abusive comments.  Internet safety is about so much more than “grooming” and we are actively seeking funding to develop a complete “stand-alone” resource at WZ that we can offer to schools either prior to or following their usual Year 6 visit.  Whatever the politicians do or don’t do about cyber bullying and trolls, we need to equip young people to feel safe, confident and secure when online.          

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