Life is what you make it, according to Tenneil!

17 year old Tenneil Ameena Badley from Birmingham was one of ten lucky winners of a Mediabox/4 Docs documentary competition. Tenneil attended a prestigious award cermony and screening in London where all the young film makers were presented with awards by Russell Brand.

The innovative competition was launched in July and asked disadvantaged young people to write a short synopsis of their documentary idea, inspired by an issue they were passionate about. Tenneil's film, called 'life is what you make it', talks about what life is like to grow up as a young black muslim woman in Birmingham. She beat hundreds of others to win one of the £500 bursaries and support from an industry mentor to help make her film. It is now available to view on the Mediabox and 4 Docs websites.
		Tenneil is interviewed by Russell Brand at the award ceremony at Channel 4

Each of the ten finalists was assigned a film industry mentor to guide and advise them through the filmmaking process. The young people and their mentors also attended an intensive practical filmmaking workshop at Channel 4. The mentors were provided by Media Trust's Youth Mentoring scheme which links disadvantaged young people to media industry professionals.

The finalists' stories were topical, thought provoking and controversial - ranging from the story of a gay teenager, to the experience of a young offender under curfew, to the life of a westernised Muslim living in the UK and a documentary about what life is like living in care.

All the films are currently available to view on FourDocs (www.channel4.com/fourdocs) and will also be shown on Charge, Community Channel's youth platform, with the runners up films scheduled for broadcast in the autumn.

The competition was funded by Mediabox, a £6 million Department for Children, Schools and Families fund for disadvantaged young people aged 13-19 to make creative media projects. FourDocs is Channel 4's broadband documentary channel offering both practical support and a high profile platform for people to make and display their own documentaries.

Following the overwhelming success of the competition, it is to be repeated in 2008. In future, Mediabox will also be teaming up with media partners from other disciplines, such as print, radio, photography and games, enabling many more young people to create media projects across a diverse range of mediums.

For more information about Mediabox, please visit www.media-box.co.uk . To view all ten films from the 2007 Mediabox and Channel 4's FourDocs Documentary Making Competition please visit www.channel4.com/fourdocs.