It may be better known for its steel bands, jerk pits and sound systems, but next month’s Notting Hill Carnival has a new addition to the line-up: a team of journalists as young as five.
Students of The Cocoa School of Journalism and Creative Arts, which opened in April, will be recording videos, carrying out interviews and writing articles. And they will all be published in Cocoa Girl and Cocoa Boy, the UK’s first Black children’s magazines.
“We want these children to have real life experiences. We give children real briefs,” explains Serlina Boyd (pictured), the woman behind both projects. “I was told as a child: ‘Keep your head down, don’t talk too much, just remember you’re the ‘other’.’ Now there comes a generation who want to show the world what they can do – and we’re giving them the platform to do that.”
