Hiya! I’m Tara and I coordinate the PEST project. I’m 30 and I live in Edinburgh. I’ve worked for Article 12 in Scotland for over 7 years - mostly part-time - and have worked in various youth work and young people’s participation projects for the last 10 years which has helped me to gain lots of different skills and experience.

The first year of the PEST project was great; I really enjoyed getting out and about, meeting new folk and seeing what was happening in different areas of the country. As you can see from the End of Year Report on this page, PEST had a busy first year.

Year 2 was exciting too; amongst others we worked with LGBT Youth Council, West Lothian Council, the Rock Trust and the young people from One Million Voices Scotland. Again, the breadth of topics was wide and varied.

Year 3 is proving to be even busier, currently we are working with Cannongate Youth Project, Edinburgh, Rock the Talk, Falkirk, the YES Project and Young Gypsy/Travellers from the Glasgow area, a group of young carers from Glasgow and in early 2009 we will be working with Donaldson's (Scotland’s national residential and day school providing education, therapy and care for pupils aged 2.5 to 19 years who are deaf or have severe speech and language difficulties) and a group of young people in the Western Isles.

The great thing about PEST is that there are no limitations on the topics that we can work on using peer education techniques. This has made the work exciting and varied…definitely not boring! We always welcome queries and new ideas, so if you have an idea and want to talk it over, please feel free to get in touch. A’ the best!

Hi, I'm Rose. I'm 23 and I've just recently moved to Edinburgh, where I'm working part time for PEST and part time organising an education project about climate change.

I've spent quite a lot of time working on different participatory education projects and being involved in organisations and groups where everyone makes decisions together and learns from each other.

No-one knows more about the lives of young people than young people themselves, so peer education is the best way of learning new things and also working together to make stuff happen. The idea behind PEST is to give young people the skills to make their voices heard and to learn from each other. It's an exciting project to be involved with, and it's giving me the chance to learn a lot from other young people which is great!

Hi! I'm Anna. I'm 30 and live in Aberdeen. I've been involved with Article 12 in Scotland for three years and have taken part in a number of their campaigns including UNCRC for Beginners Training and the All Different All Equal Campaign.

Before PEST I was at uni in Aberdeen studying History. I wanted to get involved with PEST as I believe that rights for young people are important in this day and age and although some work is done within an official capacity in youth groups and the government to inform you guys of your rights, I believe that you can learn a lot more and get more benefit from your friends and peers, which is what PEST is all about.