The successes, visions and hopes of Bermuda’s youth are to be highlighted to the community with the launch of The Royal Gazette’s National School Salute website.

The National Salute to Students programme is now in its second year and aims to instil a sense of pride in students attending middle schools and senior schools across the island.

The site, salute.rg.bm, goes live today and will feature a series of school newspapers written predominantly by students.

The schools worked closely with The Royal Gazette to create a newspaper sharing the student’s achievements and ideas.

Each paper will be published online and in The Royal Gazette over the next two weeks, starting with publications by Sandys Secondary Middle School and Clearwater Middle School.

This year, the newspapers also include articles written on topics in eight areas — education, economics, entertainment, environment, health, human rights, labour and law and politics.

The Royal Gazette youth correspondent Sarah Fellows, who launched the National Salute to Students programme last year, said: “The website is going to be an integral part of day-to-day life in schools and for parents as it continues to grow.

“We are also planning to launch a national schools newsletter which will be on the website in the new school term so students can continue to contribute. Part of the essence of the Salute is to offer a national platform for the young people of Bermuda to share their successes, hopes and visions for Bermuda.

“When we launched Salute two years ago we took the community behind the scenes of the senior schools so we are excited to have expanded it to include the middle schools.

“It has been an honour and privilege to be a part of the Salute I thank each school that has worked with us. I urge the community to take a well-needed pause to focus on our young people and listen to their voices as they are the leaders of tomorrow.”

Speaking on some of the content created by the students, Ms Fellows added: “This year, we worked on eight areas of activity within our community and that has given us a very diverse and holistic feel of how the young people in the country are feeling.

“Students were asked what they would do if they were Premier and the responses were brilliant. One said they would convert the lawn at Cabinet into a garden so we could promote gardening in the community.

“Education was covered from the need for funding to the need for more unity among the schools through inter-school events.

“Speaking on economics they talked about the disparity of wealth in the country and they shared ideas, thoughts and concerns regarding the homeless situation in Bermuda.

“One common thread that arose on the environment was the need for alternative energy.”

Students from participating schools will be saluting traffic at East Broadway over the coming two weeks and lampposts have been decorated with school colours.

Alumni of participating schools are encouraged to wear their school colours and ties over the next two weeks.

Jonathan Howes, chief executive officer of Bermuda Press (Holdings) Ltd and one of the creators of the National School Salute, said: “Sarah and I believe that students are the leaders of tomorrow and we should be listening to them now as a community when making decisions about the country they will one day lead.”

The school newspaper publication dates are:

• May 9: Sandys Secondary Middle School and Clearwater Middle School

• May 10: T.N. Tatem Middle School, Whitney Institute Middle School and Dellwood Middle School

• May 11: Somersfield Academy

• May 12: CedarBridge Academy

• May 13: Bermuda Institute

• May 16: Berkeley Institute

• May 17: Mount Saint Agnes Academy

• May 18: Warwick Academy

• May 19: Saltus Grammar School

• May 20: Bermuda High School

• For more information follow #rgschoolsalute