If there is one thing we’ve learned over the last five years, it’s this: we couldn’t have delivered a campaign to tackle the stigma of youth loneliness without handing over power to young people. And when I say, ‘handing over power’, I really do mean giving them the seat at the head of the table.
At The Co-op Foundation, we’ve been tackling the stigma of youth loneliness since 2017, when Co-op research with the British Red Cross found young people were lonely more than any other age group.
In 2022, our research revealed that 95% of young people feel lonely but only 35% feel confident talking about loneliness.
If young people are unable to talk about loneliness, they’re less likely to ask for support when they need it. This could lead to longer or more intense feelings of loneliness for young people, negatively impacting on their mental wellbeing.
We wanted to change that. That’s why, in 2019, we launched Lonely Not Alone – our campaign to tackle the stigma of youth loneliness.
The importance of youth voice
We believe campaigns or projects tackling issues that affect young people should be informed by young people’s lived experiences. Young people who have been affected by loneliness are best placed to help find solutions.
The desired outcome for all campaigns is impact. Being led by young people helped us create a truly authentic campaign that not only resonated with young people but also engaged them enough to take action.
Thanks to our young co-designers, at its peak, the campaign reached 3.1m young people with 97% of this group taking an action as a result.
How we made sure young people’s voices were heard
From day one, it was important to us that young people felt truly heard – so that’s what we did.
Nearly every year of the campaign, our young co-designers went on a creative residential. During their stay, they got to know each other and built relationships, unearthing lived experiences through the art of play, games and crafts. These exercises gave them the confidence and freedom to develop ideas to help tackle the stigma of youth loneliness.
They started by deciding what our campaign name was. Once they did this, they created an array of amazing characters to help explain how young people feel lonely.
In the same year, they came up with our first activation – asking people to wear yellow socks to show they cared about youth loneliness. We were so pleased to see so many people getting behind this idea by posting their outfits of the day on social media to help tackle the stigma of youth loneliness. We give full credit to the young people for coming up with such an engaging concept that we continued to promote throughout 2020, too.
In 2021, we created a theory of change to help us achieve a long-lasting impact for the campaign. A theory of change is a process that helps you reflect on the change you want to see and understand the plans you need to put in place to achieve it. NPC have a helpful resource to help you create your own theory of change.
As a result of implementing a new theory of change, our young co-designers planned and created the beautiful Lonely Not Alone digital universe you can explore today at lonelynotalone.org. The website has helped lonely young people from across the UK to connect with others who feel lonely for similar reasons.
There are now over 300 stories and over 70 messages of support on the universe to remind young people that they might be lonely, but they’re not alone. Our young co-designers, their guidance and their expertise helped make that happen.
Top tips for creating a digital community led by young people
- Be guided by young people’s lived experience and ensure you have safeguarding procedures in place to support them.
- Make sure to design any digital platforms with young people. They have a much greater insight into what young people would engage with, which is particularly important when deciding on activations for your campaign.
- Involve young people in social media management to create authentic engagement and give them a platform to facilitate conversations.
- Young people want to hear from other young people directly, so give them every opportunity to be involved in being a spokesperson for the campaign.
- Don’t take their ideas and run. Make sure young people are at the table for important decision-making meetings, too. You might need to adapt the meeting to ensure young people understand what is being discussed and provide them with pre-reading so they can digest information in advance.
- If you want young people to be true decision-makers and play an active role in your campaign, you need to check they’re available! Timelines should be mapped well in advance, considering busy peak periods for young people, etc.
- It’s important to remember that some of the experiences involved in creating a campaign may be very new to young people. Young people who are not creative professionals benefit from rehearsal days before photoshoots or similar events.
- Give young people active roles in developing content they’ve suggested tailored to their skills or interests. This creates a sense of ownership and gives them the opportunity to put their stamp on the campaign.
Want to find out everything we learned from the five-year campaign? Watch our webinar which reflects on our learning.
You might also be interested in our blog on how to help young people unearth lived experience.
Other blogs that may interest you:
- How people with lived experience can help shape your charity’s comms
- Bringing stories to life through short films
Banner Image: Hannah Busing on Unsplash