BT Big Voice: helping to bridge the generation gap

By Angus Kirk, Year 10 pupil at The King Edward VI School Morpeth, Northumbria

BT’s Big Voice competition gives young people the chance to make short films on inclusion and diversity issues. And the best films are going to be shown in the run up to the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

So it is a really exciting project to be involved in and students at our school were very keen to take part.

We decided to look at the problem of the generation gap in our town and see if we could change things by bringing young and old people together. And we soon found out that young and old actually have a lot in common.

The film was obviously central to the project.  But so many other activities came out of it.

For a start we kicked off the project with a 1940s event in aid of the Royal British Legion. Older people who had lived during the war came and talked to us about their experiences and memories, really bringing history alive.

These chats inspired pupils at the school to get involved in the restoration of a local war memorial. It had been vandalised and the plaque was stolen for scrap metal.

When the project was complete the Bishop of Newcastle came to rededicate the memorial and an RAF Sea King Helicopter flew over in salute. It was a very proud moment.

But more importantly it helped to change stereotypes about younger people. I’m really pleased to say that older people realised that we do care and want to make a positive difference in the world.

We also organised a dinner in the town hall for SSAFA, a charity that supports service men and their families.  Not only did it raise £500, but it gave old and young the chance to chat and learn how much we do have in common.

And there were many other things going on as well. For example, we learnt how to do a Home Guard drill, which we demonstrated at the Northumbrian Gathering and used in our Big Voice Film. I had the chance to interview the Duchess of Northumberland.

Because the project was student led we really learnt a lot from the experience and have developed so many skills that will help us in the future.

But perhaps most importantly the Big Voice competition has really brought the town of Morpeth together and bridged the generation gap.