Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year Awards 2025
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What an incredible celebration of talent we saw at the Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year Awards on 11th June 2025 at Kesgrave Conference and Community Centre!
Heats were held in 4 categories: The Environment, Mental Health and Wellbeing, Hobbies, Passions and Interests and Media and Technology.
Nearly 70 young people spoke from 15 schools and colleges across Suffolk, aged from 8 up to 18, showing incredible passion and knowledge about a range of issues, challenges and interest.
After an inspiring set of Heats in the afternoon, the judges had the unenviable task of selecting 10 finalists to go through to the evening final, which was open to the public. Our finalists spoke again, and 14 year old Amber Williamson-Brown of Claydon High School was awarded Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year 2025. Amber spoke about British Sign Language with a passionate call to arms for more people to learn the language and create a more inclusive world. Runner-up was 9 year-old Yuva Deepu from Cliff Lane Primary School, with a serious and powerful message demanding peace.
Freya Ollason of Suffolk New College won the Ormiston Social Action Award for her speech calling for improved Mental Health provision for young people.
The event gallery can be found below. You can see coverage of the event online here.
Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year Amber Williamson Brown
Yuva Deepu from Cliff Lane Primary spoke passionately about peace
Freya Ollason with Ormiston judge Ray Wang won the Social Action Award
A huge thanks go to our judges, Ray Wang from Ormiston Trust, Charlie Simmans from CF Education, Beth Derks, Caroline Harris, Martin Stolworthy and Linda Dorsett.
You can read about our ten finalists here soon. All of these worthy winners had some important messages to share about what is important to them. As a Suffolk community we can lift up these young leaders of the future by creating more opportunities and platforms for them to develop their confidence and skills, build their networks and inspire others. If you work or volunteer in an organisation in Suffolk why not consider having one of these young speakers speak at your event? Contact us at info@asseteducation.co.uk and we can connect you to them via their schools and colleges.
The Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year event is a platform for children and young people to share their view of the world through the art and power of spoken word.
At ASSET Education, our purpose in its short form is to "nurture humanity". We believe this means developing children and young people's agency, giving them opportunities to articulate their hopes, dreams and demands for their future. As members of Ipswich Social Mobility Alliance (ISMA) we made a commitment in the current ISMA action plan to create more opportunities for children and young people across Suffolk - not just those in ASSET schools - to be heard and develop their public speaking skills.
This event was designed and is run by our ASSET Alumni - young people who have left ASSET primary schools to go on to secondary school and continue to work with us on community based Youth Social Action.
Suffolk Young Speaker of the Year 2026
We are already planning the next Suffolk Young Speaker event in March 2026! If you want to hear about it as soon as we have a date and venue you can register your interest here.
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