Inspiring teenager who supports vulnerable children wins award

An inspirational young woman who volunteers her free time to help survivors of child exploitation and domestic abuse has been recognised with an award.

Freya Ricketts dedicates her efforts alongside schoolwork to advocate for those who do not have a voice and prompt change to legislation.

“I didn’t even know I’d been nominated,” Freya said. “It’s really nice to see that what I’ve been doing last year has been recognised because I’ve put a lot of time and effort into these events and other organisations.”

The 17-year-old now works with young people as part of the Imara Participation Group where she attends local and national events, raises awareness of support and fundraises as part of sexual abuse activism.

Imara is a specialist charity that supports children, young people and their family members following a disclosure or discovery of child sexual abuse or domestic violence.

After being nominated by Imara's art psychotherapist, Meghan, Freya has been awarded this year’s Young Inspiration Award, which recognises a young person who has done something inspirational and shown incredible resilience or something selfless to help others. 

The award forms part of the Live Our Best Live Awards – launched by Nottinghamshire Police in 2021 to shine a light on the inspiring work of young people across the county.

Freya has also taken part in a project with the Office for National Statistics and the University of Manchester to inform a training programme for professionals on how to best support young people.

“To know it’s going to help someone by having conversations with the researchers, it was really nice to know that this is going towards something bigger,” Freya said.

The ambitious student enjoys her studies at college, volunteers at a charity shop alongside her work with Imara and hopes to complete a police apprenticeship in the future.

Freya said:

“It’s about helping people who will go through that situation, so we’ve done loads of work with the Office for National Statistics and had conversations with the police.

“It’s about having a passion for helping others and it’s nice to have a community of people who understand you.”

Megan, Imara's art psychotherapist said:

“Freya is the kind of member that would just get stuck in. Any events that we have, any kind of research that we’re doing, any project that we’re part of, straight away she’s like ‘yep, I’ll do that’.

“She just really gets involved and she just loves being part of everything, so I knew immediately who I was going to nominate.

“It’s amazing to see Freya win this award, her reaction was amazing! She was definitely very surprised and confused, but it was lovely to be part of it.”