Bullying victim scoops Urban Hero of the Year Award

|PIC1|A 17-year-old girl from Openshaw, Manchester was named ‘Urban Hero of the Year 2009’ at a prestigious awards ceremony last Friday.

At a time when young people are more regularly portrayed in a negative light, the Awards serve to show how they are playing a vital and positive role in the life of the city.

Stephanie North was presented with the Urban Hero of the Year Award by Stagecoach founder Brian Souter at the event hosted by city youth charity The Message Trust. Earlier in the evening Stephanie had also been announced winner of the Courage Award.

Local dignitaries including Chief Constable of GMP Peter Fahy, Labour MP Hazel Blears, local councillors and several hundred business people including ‘Secret Millionaire’ Chek Whyte gathered to honour young achievers from Manchester who have made a difference to their communities across the city. Each award winner has overcome serious obstacles like drug addiction, tough backgrounds, and in Steph’s case, violent bullying, to emerge as heroes.

Back in 2008, Stephanie began hanging around with a new group of friends. Though they had seemed friendly to begin with, they began to change and one night turned on Stephanie and violently attacked her, breaking her nose and leaving her with two black eyes. The police were involved and charges were made.

Stephanie was encouraged by her youth workers to stand up and tell the truth. She chose to pursue justice to make sure it would not happen again to others by taking her attackers to court, despite a lot of intimidation from others in the community.

"To do that when people know where you live is really hard," explains Openshaw community worker Pete Askew. "In communities where crime is high, the only thing that can make a difference sometimes is to say 'No, we’re not willing to say nothing… we’re going to speak out against what’s happened'."

"It’s been really quite a tough thing – she’s not the sort of person who normally mouths off at people so it’s taken a lot of courage to do that and that’s why we think she’s well deserving of this award."

Like Stephanie, all of the Urban Hero Award winners have been directly impacted by The Message Trust’s work in schools, communities and prisons across Greater Manchester.

Other winners included a former drug addict now helping to mentor other young men at risk of addiction, an inspirational sixteen-year-old living with cerebral palsy, a youth worker who gave up a highly successful business and moved to one of Manchester’s toughest estates to work with young people, and a recently released young offender who has turned his life around in prison.