MP Andrew Mitchell met with students from Plantsbrook School’s Envision team last week to hear how they are taking action to encourage and support young people to adopt healthy lifestyles. The team of 16 and 17 year olds have been working on their healthy living project since last September and last month they launched their own website to promote the benefits of healthy living and to offer tips on how to stay fit and active. Envision Team member, Amber, said, “We wanted to tackle this issue because we feel that not enough young people know how to be healthy in their lifestyles. You get all the “health‟ messages from the NHS and adults, but they’re never written in a way that young people connect with – so we thought the message would have a lot more impact coming from us as young people.” As part of their new website each of the 8 team members have committed themselves to a “Vitality Challenge‟ and will be posting blog articles about how they get on. The team have named themselves and their website STEV.e – Striving to Encourage Vitality.envision. The Plantsbrook Team have been supported by Envision; an educational charity currently running a “Truth about Youth‟ programme as part of the Cooperative Foundation’s £280,000 National Programme. Teams of 16-19 year olds from 25 schools and colleges across Birmingham, including Plantsbrook, John Willmott and Arthur Terry School in Sutton Coldfield, are currently setting up their own youth-led projects with the aim of dispelling the negative stereotype young people are often labelled with. Andrew Mitchell expressed support for the way the group has set about addressing a problem they were concerned about. Andrew Mitchell MP said, “I think the “Truth about Youth‟ campaign is a fantastic idea and I’ve seen first-hand some of the great work young people at Envision are doing. “These young people are taking the initiative to think about problems in our society and setting themselves a challenge to do something about it. I’m proud that my constituency has lots of young people who are making a positive contribution.” The Plantsbrook Envision Team are now planning to produce a short film on healthy living which they hope can encourage younger students to live a healthier lifestyle. For updates on their film, blogs, healthy living tips and the team’s personal challenges visit their website www.wix.com/steve_envision/steve.