Describe your best practice
Neighbourhood Watch worked with a Youth Worker and P.C.S.O, using Neighbourhood Watch Network’s Crime Prevention Serious Violence Toolkit and the Home Office website, providing a mixture of videos, including those featuring Leicester City FC and boxer Antony Joshua, a Quiz and interactive videos to see how the choices we make impact on our lives.
There was opportunity for discussion, questions and answers and everyone who attended was given, and wore, a “#LivesNotKnives – Make the right choice” wristband from Leicestershire Police.
What did you do and why?
We ran interactive knife crime awareness sessions for two different age group of young people (ages 11-14 and 14-18) who attend a Youth Café in Earl Shilton, Leicestershire. The sessions provided young people with correct, accurate information about the dangers of carrying knifes, being with someone carrying a knife and the consequences of using one.
We wanted to give young people the confidence to know what to do it they come across knife crime or are aware that someone is carrying a weapon, what to do if someone has been stabbed and the consequences.
Although we do not have a knife crime issue in our town, our young people are very aware of incidents across the UK. We want to ensure that our area remains knife free for our young people and all our community.
Duration of the project
30 minute session for 11-14 year olds and 40 minute session for 14 – 18 year olds.
What worked well?
We were delighted that both sessions went really well. The young people were actively involved, interested and engaged and all stayed for the whole session. We were surprised at how much acurate information the young peole knew about knife crime and how open they were about discussing it and asking about it.
The video “How Not To Die from A Stabbing” had the most impact with the room falling completely silent. You could literally hear a pin drop! During the Quiz there was one group who didn’t look as if they were participating at all and but they verbally answered all the questions! Our P.C.S.O. answered questions and chatted with the youngsters. It was lovely to see barriers between police and young people being broken down. The following day our P.C.S.O. and Youth Worker were in school and lots of students said ‘hello’ and wore their wrist bands.
How did you overcome any challenges?
We were concerned about the suitability of the Quiz for the older group but they all participated and no-one abstained. However we thought that it was too easy and not challenging enough so we would change it for future use. Perhaps video scenarios giving different choices to change the ending so that they could see how specific choices could affect their lives. This would stimulate discussion about ‘what if’ scenarios.
An adult was needed to oversee each Quiz Team to stop the use of mobile phones to find the answers. We also realised that we needed to remove the knife crime leaflets as these also contained the answers.
The videos were short and shown on different screens, so that everyone could easily see them, and were interspersed with adults contributions. They also related directly to our area ,i.e. Leicester City Football Club.
How did you cover any costs?
The only monetary cost involved was for the sweets, and bags to put them in, as prizes for the Quiz. Although everyone was given a bag at the end. This was covered by a small donation.
Leicestershire Police leaflet “Knife Crime”, Flyers “#LivesNotKnives” and wristbands, Fearless.org poster “Be fearless Speak out against weapon crime” were all free to use.
Force/ Borough area
Leicestershire