Feltham teenagers tackle racism head on

For their citizenship GCSE coursework they have been given the task of raising awareness of an issue they feel strongly about and they all immediately decided on violence and racism.

They are now working with Aik Saath, a charity dedicated to promoting peace and racial harmony among young people, particularly from ethnic minority communities.

Ayesha, of Raleigh Road, suffered racial abuse from from teenagers in Feltham last year.

"I think violence and racism is more of a problem than it used to be," she said. "I was bullied by racists in Feltham last year and in the past my family have suffered a lot from it so I thought this was my chance to make a difference.

"We wanted to choose a charity that meant something to us because of our own experience."

All citizenship students at the Browell's Lane school are taking part in similar projects and the girls stand to win £3,000 for Aik Saath if their campaign is deemed most successful by teachers.

The charity, whose name means 'together as one' in Hindu, Urdu and Punjabi, is based in Berkshire but has pledged to do some work in Feltham after the girls raised it as a problem area.

Kajil, of South Road, said: "We had to decide what we thought was a big issue in our society and we thought violence was becoming a bigger and bigger issue.

"There are still a lot of racist people out there and we need to stop that. We hope people will see our message and try to make a difference too."

Teacher Amy Bernard said: "They are very impressive ladies. It's a very impressive topic for them to pick and it is great that they have taken it on."