#iwill week 2022 took place from 21st – 25th November and what a week it was!

In 2021, our hugely successful #iwill week explored the idea of “building a movement”. In 2022, we wanted to explore how, in practice, we achieve this together. Another year brought new challenges, and as ever, young people bear the brunt of these. In these times of uncertainty, we needed to address how will we work better together to ensure that we are enabling youth social action. 

That’s why this year, The #iwill Movement – powered by UK Youth and Volunteering Matters – came together to explore how we’re pulling together for youth social action, shedding light on the challenges faced by young activists and changemakers today. 

We experienced meaningful conversations amongst our incredible #iwill ambassadors and our friends across the youth sector, around how we can continue to support youth social action into 2023, focusing on these five areas: 

• Are we really working together? What we need to learn about working across sectors. 
• In my hometown: How can young people shape a place? 
• It’s tough out here: Creating genuinely enabling environments for young people. 
• How do we strike the balance when building a movement? 
• Are you with us? The role of funders in all this 

The insightful, empowering and inspirational #iwill ambassadors shared their thoughts across the week, which expressed their thoughts on everything from place-based work to digital social action campaigning.  

But don’t take it from us, here directly from our young people taking on social action themselves: 

‘Young people are the future, but we’re also the energy of today!’ 

Beth, #iwill Ambassador 

‘By uniting very diverse groups of young people to work together to create change, we can ensure this change is inclusive of all different types of people and communities so any change we make as young people, will have the greatest impact … Effective collaboration can’t happen without effective communication’. 

Fatima, #iwill Ambassador 

“We can all be changemakers and it’s important that industry leaders… are listening to the up and coming leaders and bosses, and giving us the opportunities to learn and grow together” 

Lella, #iwill Ambassador 

“[Leaders should] work with young people and share their power. Don’t do it for them, do it with them…I always say that my voice is my weapon” 

Liv, Young Manchester 

“You’ve got the power within you. Everything that #iwill stands for, like the power of youth is so true. The youth have power… we want to make safe spaces and have safe homes” 

Pelumi, #iwill Ambassador 

“We really get to put conversations into action and make sure that these things aren’t just words. It isn’t just error, or words on a paper. It’s tangible actions that we’re looking for, I’m so excited to see the future of #iwill, especially as we come up to the 10 Year Anniversary, and really being able to reflect with older ambassadors and the newer ones” 

Claire, #iwill Ambassador 

“To me, the #iwill movement is people. We transition over time and pivot and adapt and you’re not able to adapt and move with the times, you’re going to die out. We don’t want to be like Blockbuster, we want to be like Netflix! … We’re just going to keep on bringing amazing young people onto this and we’re going to continue to learn from each other … we’re the cream of the crop” 

Jonas, #iwill Ambassador 

“There is this stigma of needing to go down one route you choose your GCSEs. You’re 12, 13,14? it’s like you’re having to categorize yourself. ‘Oh, I’m not into math, because I’m not very mathy,’ ‘Oh, I’m not into tech, because I’m not technical’. Why are we casting ourselves off like that? So I always say, be an ‘and’ not an ‘or’.” 

Lella, #iwill Ambassador 

“I have grown up believing that my future is tied to the features of other people, whether that’s my neighbours, complete strangers on the other side of the world, or members of my generation. When you’re part of something far bigger than yourself, I think you feel a responsibility to be making part of making it better.” 

Gracie, #iwill Ambassador 

“Something that I’ve been more aware of recently is the fact that being a changemaker is actually a privilege and some people are too busy and trying to just survive that. They’re not actually able to make a difference. So I think for those of us who do have that privilege, we need to be able to make an environment that includes other people who don’t necessarily have that privilege.” 

Irys, #iwill Ambassador 

“There’s so much youth washing around now. That’s become a real buzzword in the last year or two because I think we’ve just seen so much of it happening, which is where young people are invited into conversations or invited to have a seat at the table. But then it’s kind of a token thing. Having proper youth engagement is just making sure that if you do include young people in the decisions you’re making, that you’re actually properly listening to what they have to say. I think though if you’re seeing that young people are wanting to be listened to and you want to promote that you’re listening to young people, then it shows.” 

Kids Against Plastic, youth climate activists 

Thanks to all of the incredible members of The #iwill Movement who took part and helped us to make this year’s #iwill week one to remember. If you couldn’t make one, or more of the incredible #iwill week events, don’t worry. Revisit the week here