Hallam teaches South Yorkshire teenagers about healthy relationships

It's part of our YOYO project in schools across our county

Author: Ben BasonPublished 18th Dec 2017

Hallam's been going into South Yorkshire schools to teach teenagers about the importance of healthy relationships.

It's part of the YOYO project we're running with the Police and Crime Commissioner to teach lessons about dangerous behaviour like taking drugs and sexting.

We're using media to get kids engaged in important topics - by helping them make informative videos and podcasts that are uploaded to the internet.

Tilly's in Year 9 at Ridgewood School in Doncaster - she's one of the students who've been involved in one of our healthy relationship sessions.

She says it's important to learn about them:

"There's a lot of peer pressure out there and at our age people don't really understand the consequences of doing stuff. They can be shy so they don't want to say what's going on or tell people because they're scared of the end result of the situation.

"We've got to be aware for the future because it doesn't just stop when we get out of our teenage years, it's always happening, it's a relationship. It's behind closed doors so anything could be happening that you're not aware of."

We've been telling the children about important concepts like consent and domestic violence so they can recognise problems in their own relationships in the future and get support if they need it.

Darren Summerill is Year 9 Achievement Coordinator at Ridgewood - he says his year group are a good target for these lessons:

"They're at that age now where they are going to be getting into relationships, particularly at 13, 14 years old. Some are having relationship issues as we speak. The things that have been brought up, some of the kids in there have experienced them or are aware of other people experiencing them.

"What's right for certain people in terms of relationships at this age is not always right for somebody else and with peer pressure people do feel pressured into various things and highlighting they can always turn round and say no at any point is vital.

"A team that's as high profile as Hallam FM, the kids were absolutely buzzing to hear of this project when I first mentioned it to them and it's certainly seemed to grip and engage them."