Our Bright Future Celebration

Celebrating our work with young people

Connecting young people with nature

Our Bright Future was an ambitious and innovative partnership led by The Wildlife Trusts that brought together the youth and environmental sectors. This £33 million programme, funded by the National Lottery Community Fund, was formed of 31 projects across the UK.

Over five years, from January 2016 through to December 2021, Our Bright Future worked within Avon to ensure young people are connected to nature and equipped to protect it into the future. Here we tell the story of how we have increased young people’s connection to nature, helped young people develop skills and experience for a greener economy, improved green spaces for people and wildlife and given young people the space and voice to act as catalysts for change. This included setting up young volunteering, a work experience offer and an Avon Wildlife Youth Forum.

This work is important to help young people improve their skills and gain experience but also for their mental health and wellbeing. We found that overall young people felt more connected to nature and able to achieve what they wanted to after being involved in this project.

2016 - 2021

Here we have collected some of the stories, photos and testimonials from the last five years. We think it deserves celebrating and for that reason we are sharing these stories with you.

We are passionately committed to sustaining and building on our work with young people ensuring they become catalysts for change, connect with nature and improve the environment in which we all live. As well as integrating the youth voice into all areas of the Trust's activity we will continue to develop groups and support them to have their voices heard.

Thanks to funding from Players of People's Postcode Lottery we are continuing to offer young people opportunities to volunteer with us, and we are currently consulting with young people to explore how best we can help them to build their skills and confidence to take action for nature and getting start in green careers.