Last updated 13:08, Friday, 18 July 2008

Wigton Youth Station will be celebrating its 10 year anniversary on the 1st August this year and is planning a reunion for everyone who has played a part in its success.

• Wigton Youth Station View more pictures...

The Youth Station Summer Project

Volunteers, helpers, funders, friends and children will be invited to celebrate the big ten years with BBQ, circus skills and dance workshop to mark the event.

The Youth Station provides a valuable resource for youths within Wigton and is targeted at eleven to nineteen year olds. Centre manager Angela Bicknell is keen to provide a base and a safe venue for people to meet in town and to augment the youngsters education by exploring non academic subjects.

Angela said, "We try to promote projects and themes which engage people. Fitness, drug awareness, crime and citizenship are all topics we can explore and build projects around. The centre provides a really valuable resource and because people come here voluntarily and are not forced to attend as with the schools, they really engage with the place and play an active role in running things and decision making."

The Youth Station is currently looking into obtaining an accreditation for the Duke of Edinburgh training scheme and works hard to provide a varied and stimulating environment.

A project running over the summer this year will see the blank walls of the venues rear yard transformed with a mural depicted scenes from around the world. Children will be invited to flex their artistic muscle and will be creating scenes from Africa, America, Australia and any number of countries around the centres courtyard.

Angela said," It's important that we run projects over the summer. Traditionally, it's a quiet time for the centre. The good weather, holidays and light evenings give people other things to do so we try to engage people with projects and trips. When the winter arrives and the dark evenings arrive we get really busy."

The Youth Station has provided a valuable venue within Wigton for eleven to nineteen year olds for ten years and its popularity is a testament to its success and hard work.

Angela said, "Unlike schools, this is a voluntary organisation and the real measure that we're doing things right comes down to the fact that young people continue to come through the door which is their vote of confidence for the Youth Station."