The British media over the past couple of weeks has painted a very negative picture of teenage life and youth culture.

Theirs is the Wikipedia generation, where everyone gets to contribute. It's the YouTube generation, where everyone gets to be heard. It's the MySpace generation, where my space is shared with everyone else.

In short, it's 'WE' generation. Millennials are team-players; and they're more civic-minded than either Generation X or the Boomer generation that went before.

Teams need captains. As it emerges into its period of social influence, the Millennial generation will be looking within itself to find people who can head up great projects.

Rather than being downcast about the problems of youth culture, we should concentrate on preparing those leaders, equipping the generation for influence.

This begins with fostering an atmosphere around young people where success and excellence are normal.

There is so much acceptance of mediocrity, so much worship of the average in British life. We need to pass on to the young a generosity of spirit that pushes them beyond the norm; so that they will do the surprising and the unexpected.

We need to set a higher standard of expectation for the young, too. After around 30 years of working, at one level or another, with younger generations, it makes me angry to learn that the British government is finally encouraging teenagers to delay their first sexual encounter until they're 'at least 16 years of age'.

The government has tried everything else; now, only as a last resort, it wants to give saying 'no' a chance! And only until they're sixteen - after all, we can't expect them to practice self-control.

We're telling our kids they'll never achieve the willpower to stay celibate, simply because many of us have failed at it so miserably.

Finally, we need to encourage the Millennial generation to relate their future goals to present-tense realities.

I've had the privilege of seeing nine books published. But my first book was in many ways the most enjoyable. It was a novel, or novellete, written when I was in the fifth grade at the urging of my teacher, Miss Paige.

I owe a lot to that teacher. She created in me a new gestaldt, a new vision of reality. She made the promise of my future real in the present.

When we do this for young people, we give them a new paradigm for reality, which then leads to a fresh culture and a positive way of behaving.

James Freeman Clarke wrote: 'A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman, of the next generation.' We need statespeople in business, education, the media, the political world and the home; people who will celebrate and help shape the positive side of youth culture.

ASBO: Anti-Social Behaviour Order.