Apply Today for the National Youth Awards

Are you an active youth in your community? If you are doing good work that is making an impact, then you may qualify for the National Youth Awards.  The Department of Youth Services is now accepting nominations for this year’s awards. Dominique Noralez of the Department of Youth Services tells us more about the requirements and how you can apply.

Dominique Noralez, Primary Youth Services Youth Intern, DYS

“We host every year, to celebrate the achievement of young people in different fields like music, art, dance, entrepreneurship. We have seventeen categories this year and the newest one being the young unionist award. We host the youth awards in November but we decided to start early this year to get a huge catalogue of nominations. People nominate by going online to any of our social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and on our website: www.dys.bz , our application forms are right there. If for some reason you don’t have access to internet, you can stop by to one of our countries across the country and we all have forms to help you and our officers are ready and to help fill those you out.”

Dominique Noralez

Andrea Polanco

“What are some of the requirements you must meet in order to be eligible for the youth awards?”

Dominique Noralez

“First of all, you have to be between the ages of 15-29; that is the definition of youth in Belize. You just have to show evidence that you are doing great work in Belize. So, if you are a musician, you should show us some music or lyrics. If you are a writer or journalist, show us the news article you’ve written or the interviews you’ve conducted. If you are a unionist show us the work you have done in your trade union or teachers union or whatever it is you’ve done. So, just be able to show us the evidence you’ve done within your specific field.”

The deadline for submissions is in October and the awards ceremony will be held in November.