Forty-eight Year 8 pupils from Furness Academy in Barrow have taken part in a pilot programme to raise awareness of the seriousness of knife crime. The initiative aimed to educate young people about the effects that carrying a knife can have on potential victims, the perpetrator, families, medical staff, peer groups and the wider community.
The interactive programme was set up in May 2021, after several serious crime incidents in Barrow and concerns that some young people felt the pressure to carry a knife as a means of protection.
The initiative is led by Cumbria County Council’s South Cumbria Pupil Referral Unit (PRU) and Drop Zone Youth Projects and is supported by Cumbria Police, Walney Community Trust, Child Centred Policing, Barrow Integrated Care Community (ICC) and University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust (UHMBT).
Feedback from the students was extremely positive and the main points they raised were:
- that they preferred external agencies to come in and deliver programmes
- that they were moved by the personal stories and felt it helped them understand certain consequences
- that they found the interactive delivery and learning from experience was beneficial.
You can read the full story at the Bay Health and Care Partners website here.