St Austell became the location of a new film about teenage pregnancy on 26th & 27th October 2009 when young people from ‘The House’ youth facility worked with Blind Ditch to research, script, storyboard and shoot a film on the issue.
The young people themselves were responsible for fundraising for the project, and were successful in obtaining a grant from the Terrance Higgins Trust to make a film specifically about teenage pregnancy. Statistics show that there is a greater chance of young women Collette’s age getting pregnant in St Austell than other areas of the UK. Young people at ‘The House’ saw an opportunity to do something positive in the area to address the issue.  The film tells the story of fictional characters ‘Collette’ a 15 year old St Austell girl and her boyfriend ‘Andrew’ of the same age go through the emotions and anxiety connected to the belief that she might be pregnant, following Collette as she plucks up the courage to buy and take a pregnancy test. Youth worker Kate Heath says “we are aware that many of the young people we meet have experience of these issues, either personally or know friends who have. As well as being a fun experience for the young people, the film project will form part of our programme of sex education, and we hope the storyboards that we’re putting up in the town and the resulting film will be shown in other youth clubs and local schools to spread the message.” On the run up to the shoot, the young people produced a storyboard of the film from which 10 images were selected and reproduced on a large scale to be erected across town, including at St Austell train station to be seen by hundreds of visitors, commuters and rail travellers.  The story boards are a great advertisement of the project to the local community, not only to show off the young people’s work but also to gather interest from any members of the public who want to get involved either as cast members, extras or crew! A screening for local dignitaries, teachers, health professionals, youth workers, young people and their families is to be held at The House in December. Dream it Large St Austell was facilitated by Blind Ditch for young people at The House. The project is funded by Groundwork, the Terrence Higgins Trust via the National Lottery Big Lottery fund. 
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