A teenager from Calverton has stopped the top gong at a Nottinghamshire youth award ceremony held last night.
Cameron-Lei Ford was amongst seven other teenagers from across the area who were picked up their 4Uth Awards during a ceremony held at Nottinghamshire County Hall in West Bridgford last night.
As well as securing the award for the Gedling area, Cameron was also named overall winner.
He said: “I am over the moon to have won and I will act upon it and take it forward. I would like to try to take on more of my friends and try to expand the enterprise.”
More than 65,000 people have engaged through social media channels including Twitter, Facebook and Instagram as part of this year’s annual youth awards using the hashtag: #4Uth, with more than 80 young people nominated for outstanding achievements.
Nottinghamshire County Council Leader Councillor Alan Rhodes said: “Many congratulations to all of our district award winners in this year’s 4Uth awards. This event was a great opportunity to highlight and celebrate their outstanding achievements.
“Cameron’s was a very impressive application. He is a very motivated young man showing tenacity and a determination to turn his life around and he has had some extremely difficult issues in his life.
“He has taken time to volunteer in his community, has taken time to develop his entrepreneurial skills and he has now become a very well respected young man in the Calverton community.
“Cameron has been an excellent role model for other young people – his social enterprise skills have come to the fore, he has been involved in gardening projects for other people, he has involved other young people in his community and encouraged them to do their bit to make life better for others in the Calverton community.”
He was nominated for the award by youth worker Mohammed Yaseen who is based at Calverton Young People’s Centre which Cameron attends.
Mr Yaseen revealed he nominated Cameron for overcoming a number of personal problems before going on to successfully help other young people in his local community by setting up a successful social enterprise.
He said: “For many years Cameron had experienced bullying because of being overweight. He struggled with poor self-image and his academic performance deteriorated and he was seen by youth workers to be behaving in an anti-social way more and more.
“With support from youth workers, Cameron became involved in community clean-ups. He started with his own street and then parts of his wider neighbourhood.
“He has since volunteered to tidy up local elderly people’s gardens and, inspired by his uncle, he has established a social enterprise to help young people earn money at weekends and holiday periods. “The aims of his social enterprise include tackling social problems caused by youth unemployment and anti-social behaviour, improving community spirit and pride in public spaces, and improving young people’s life chances and the environment.”
Councillor Rhodes and Councillor Liz Plant, Committee Vice-Chairman for Children and Young People’s Services, helped to judge the overall awards.
Councillor Liz Plant said: “The awards night is always a very special occasion and we were delighted that so many people were able to have their accomplishments recognised though these awards. We had a fantastic reaction to our initial call for nominations once again this year and thank everyone for taking their time to get involved and promote just some of the fantastic things that young people across Nottinghamshire achieve every day.”
The annual 4Uth awards recognise the outstanding achievements of young people across the county for a variety of different areas such as outstanding achievement, caring for others, vital contribution within a local community and overcoming adversity.
Find out more about the 4Uth awards on the Nottinghamshire County Council website: www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/4uth2016
