Two years ago a group of Thorpe Edge teenagers embarked on a training scheme to help make a difference to young people in their community.

They believed that coming from a run-down estate meant they were expected to do nothing more but get pregnant, turn to drugs and have no educational success.

But now nine out of the 14 are starting a university place this summer and are hoping to go on and train as youth workers, social and community workers.

The group of 18 to 25-year-olds are part of the Youth Action Team in Newlands, which is funded by regeneration cash.

More than 2,000 young people in the area have benefited from their work on health, crime and the environment.

Now the new regeneration agency Yorkshire Forward is looking for similar ways to revitalise the region over the next decade, and is looking for the views of the public about needs and priorities.

They are giving Bradford people the chance to say how their communities can be regenerated with millions of pounds of funding on offer.

Yorkshire Forward is the new name for the Regional Development Agency. It has taken over the role of English Partnerships and the Rural Development Commission and is also responsible for administering Single Regeneration Budgets.

The group is drawing up a Regional Economic Strategy for the next ten years - the first of its kind in Yorkshire and Humberside.

The group has been given the task of putting Yorkshire on the world map and wants to hear from ordinary people, as well as businesses, schools and other agencies, how that can be achieved.

The document has to be in the hands of Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott by October. The group has been assigned £170 million for the first year and want the cash to help regenerate communities.

A special task group visited deprived communities in the region including the Newlands Youth Action Team.

Adeeba Malik, a Yorkshire Forward board member, said: "The youth team is a great example of what can be done to help regenerate a community.

"Yorkshire Forward will take these lessons on board and, hopefully, we can encourage through our partners similar schemes across the region."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.