Student Scores in BBC Young Reporter Competition

Student Scores in BBC Young Reporter Competition!

We are delighted to announce that Year 11 student, Luke, has been chosen as the West Midlands Regional Winner of the 2023 BBC Young Reporter Competition. The announcement was made during the BBC One Show on Wednesday 21st June. The competition, now in its fifth year, gives 11-18-year-olds across the UK a chance to produce their own report on a topic personal to them.

Luke’s winning report, which was chosen from thousands of entries, explores the issue of concussion in football; a problem he became aware of after watching Wolverhampton Wanderers player, Raúl Jiménez, suffer a fractured skull after he rose for a header during a match against Arsenal in November 2020. Luke, who has been a Wolves Season Ticket Holder since 2019, wanted to understand what the impacts could be on one of his footballing heroes. 

Sixteen-year-old Luke demonstrated a natural flair for journalism when he participated in BBC WM Sport Commentator, Mike Taylor’s, workshop at the BBC Young Reporter event held at WGS in March. Luke, who played football from the age of five, only hanging up his boots last year to begin refereeing, is incredibly passionate about the sport and has hopes for a future career in sports commentating or sports journalism. 

His win comes a year after WGS student, Jaipal, won the same competition with her report about surrogacy. He shared with us, “It was a really good experience and I really enjoyed doing it… Jaipal won last year, that inspired me to enter…It’s really good to win and gives me really good hope for my future career.”; a hope that we certainly share with Luke.

All the winners of the BBC Young Reporter Competition will have their reports professionally produced and broadcast across the BBC network. We look forward to seeing Luke on our TV screens soon!

Thank you to Head Librarian, Mrs Rowley, for organising our BBC Young Reporter Club and for supporting the students throughout their submissions; we are so proud of everyone who participated.