Athboy student's role in European media project

Athboy student Amy Bracken was among 25 candidates hand-picked from over 150 hopeful applicants nationwide to partake in the Youth Media for Europe project. Amy, a UCD arts student, was involved in compiling a new report on young people and politics called 'Perspectives on Youth, Media and Politics'. Youth Media for Europe is an all-island project run by four partner organisations, European Movement Ireland, Irish Youth Media Development, Old Museum Arts Centre and Youth Action Northern Ireland. The project, which was supported by Léargas, involved the selection of 25 young people from throughout the island of Ireland to be online correspondents for the European elections and the Lisbon Treaty. The new report details interesting observations on young people's relationship with politics and the media. It finds that home and school environments play a central role in influencing how young people vote. The report also found that the voting system tends to make things 'needlessly difficult' for young people, with systems such as the postal vote proving extremely awkward to organise. Straight-talking recommendations are also made in the report. Aimed at politicians, the media, the EU and young people, the young e-journalists make innovative suggestions on how a greater interest in EU matters could be generated. A strong message goes out to politicians in the report. The young e-journalists do not hold back and state that when it came to voting for election candidates, it was all about personality, rather than party. Avoiding answering simple questions directly was found to be a key reason behind young people's disillusionment with politicians. The aim of the all-island project was to provoke wider discussion and foster greater understanding of the European political debate among young people. The report launch took place on Friday last at Europe House, Dawson Street. It also featured a panel discussion on 'citizen journalism' with guest speaker Professor Farrel Corcoran where the unprecedented role that social media played during the campaigns was discussed.