On the 12th December 2011 members of Argyll and Bute Youth Forum descended upon the Nichol Hall in Inveraray to participate in the first SQA Youth Bank training to be held in Mid Argyll. Representatives from Campbeltown, Bute, Mid Argyll and Oban Youth Forums enjoyed an informative and fun packed full day of training on all aspects of running a youth bank, expertly delivered by Heather McVey of Youth Link Scotland.

Taking part in this certificated training provided the young people with:

Increased confidence and sense of empowerment resulting in raised aspirations.
Development of new skills, experiences and qualifications.
Viewed by others as active citizens and positive contributors to society.
Improved financial and emotional literacy.
Increased employability.
Improved sense of empowerment through increased confidence and capacity as well a immense sense of achievement.
Turning good ideas for community benefit into action.
Gaining a better understanding of their community and an increased sense of belonging to it.
Gain valuable life experience - application process, form filling, project management, budgeting, marketing, evaluation etc.
Viewed as valued positive contributors to society.
In order for the young people to attain 1 credit at SCQF level 5 they had to do a lot of prep work and do a presentation to all the other young people in attendance, this included drawing a community map to plot all the places of interest to young people in their respected area; good and bad. They then had to identifying issues and connecting these to spaces and places on the map this included facilities, activities to do, places to go, places where young people hang out, place names, buildings, youth facilities etc.

They also had to gather information on

What are the good and bad things about your community?
How many young people live in your community?
Are there any places with particular problems, crime, etc.
Furthermore the young people had to identify how grant making could improve their community and help develop some of the areas they had identified, As well as preparing a list of some examples of types of projects that would be good for the community. Finally they had to write a reflective essay to describe how they went about completing the three tasks giving details of their individual role and contribution, skills used and comment on whether they found out anything new about their community.

Raymond J Flanagan of the Youth Services Team stated that all the young people were involved in all activities and were very knowledgeable of what issues affected young people in their specific areas and what needed done to improve them. All the presentations were well researched and confidently delivered. All the young people are looking forward to the second phase of the training.

This opportunity was made possible by Argyll and Bute Youth Forum receiving a grant from Cashback to the Community and the training chosen fits in with the delivery on the Scottish Governments National Outcome 4 .“Our young people are successful learners, confident individuals, effective contributors and responsible citize