Wires Crossed is an innovative education programme to promote positive physical and mental well-being, safe risk-taking, self-control and social inclusion among young people through the art of funambulism (tight-wire walking with a balancing stick). The project develops competences for youth circus trainers and promotes high quality youth work that is inclusive and reaches young people with fewer opportunities. This Strategic Partnership project is the first phase of a large-scale European project led by Galway Community Circus and their partners Ecole de Cirque de Bruxelles and Cabuwazi in 2017-2021 as part of the Galway 2020 European Capital of Culture programme. The objectives of the project are to develop skills and competences of youth circus trainers; help youth circus organisations increase their capacity; improve health and wellbeing and social, personal and life skills of young people; develop and share effective methods in reaching out to marginalized youth; promote social inclusion, solidarity and intercultural dialogue; help young people with fewer opportunities become more engaged and involved in society; help young refugees become more integrated in their local community and connected to young people in other parts of Europe; and to make funambulism a widely used innovative educational method in youth and social circus sector and beyond. The project is delivered through non-formal education in a youth work setting using the creative and physical methods and active participation of youth circus education. It will include two Transnational project meetings and four Learning/Teaching/Training activities; three staff training events for youth circus trainers and one blended mobility for young people. The project sets out to develop high quality skills and competences for twelve youth circus trainers from Belgium, Germany and Ireland. This will be done by providing a 4-month training for staff of the partner organisations. During this four-month period the youth circus trainers will take part in three short-term staff training events in Galway and Brussels. The training will focus on technical competences in funambulism and pedagogic competences for educators as well as skills to work with diverse target groups. The fourth LTT activity is a blended mobility for young people - a 5-day youth exchange in Berlin. The twelve participants of the exchange are youth circus members from partner organisations and young refugees aged 18-30 years of age. Six of the participants are young people with fewer opportunities. The funambulism training will follow methodology developed by the partners and an expert team in Spring 2017. The LTT activities will pilot, test and evaluate the methodology. After this project the methodology will be disseminated to ten European countries in the next phase of Wires Crossed project. The funambulism training during the LTT activities is facilitated by a funambulism expert team from France. The project themes of mental health & wellbeing, social inclusion, engagement and participation of marginalised youth and young people with fewer opportunities and innovative projects to support young people’s development are highlighted in the EU Strategy for youth Investing and Empowering Youth, EU 2020 – Youth on the move and the priorities of Erasmus+. The project is the first of its kind in the word and will play a key role in building capacity and international and cross-sectoral cooperation for the growing youth circus sector in Ireland, Belgium, Germany and beyond. The results of the project are shared widely through the European Youth and Social Circus Network Caravan and through partnership with Galway 2020 European Capital of Culture. Potential long term benefits of the project include improvement of physical and mental wellbeing and social inclusion among young people and youth circus education becoming a better recognized tool for social change.
Wires Crossed - Balancing Act for Europe project came about from the desire to provide an inclusive, safe and engaging outlet for young people to take part in physical and creative activities which enhance their sense of well-being. The project partners were Galway Community Circus from Ireland, École de Cirque de Bruxelles from Belgium and CABUWAZI from Germany - all youth circus schools which use circus arts education as a tool for social, personal and community development and for promoting social inclusion and positive physical and mental wellbeing. The project reacted to the hidden crisis on youth mental health in Europe by preparing a training for youth circus trainers in funambulism (tightwire walking with a balancing pole) - an activity that combines physical activity, mental well-being techniques and circus arts. All three areas help young people by providing opportunities for self-expression, building self-confidence, social interaction and integration as well as improving their control over symptoms of anxiety and depression. They also increase positive risk taking both physically and emotionally, they promote physical health and body awareness, increase self-confidence and self-efficacy, improves social connectedness, teamwork, and leadership skills within the group and enables participants to acquire a broadened skill base relating to circus as well as more generic 'life skills'. This project was the first European project of a multi-annual programme, 'Wires Crossed', delivered by Galway Community Circus as one of the anchor projects of Galway European Capital of Culture 2020. Wires Crossed are leading to a large-scale Galway 2020 project culminating in big community gathering in Galway in June 2020 where 400 people of all ages, cultures and backgrounds from all around Europe cross the River Corrib on tightwires to celebrate diversity and highlight the importance of physical and mental well-being. There were two groups of participants in the project - 12 youth circus tutors learning how to teach funambulism to young people and 12 youth participants with fewer opportunities (including young refugees) taking a part in a youth exchange. The project activities comprised of: - Two transnational meetings of project coordinators in Galway and Brussels. - Three professional trainings in Galway and Brussels led by French funambulism experts Denis Josselin and Bruno Frenette for the group of 12 youth circus tutors that enabled them to teach funambulism in heights up to 2 meters and gave them basic rigging and health and safety training necessary for delivering funambulism activities. Two of the trainings also included the crossing of a waterway on the tightwire - over a canal in Brussels and the Claddagh Pool in Galway City. [To see a video of crossing in Galway please go to: http://bit.ly/2o8bzan] - A youth exchange in Berlin for young people from the three partner countries which brought together youth participants from disadvantaged backgrounds and young refugees. All of the initial project objectives were met: - To develop the skills & competences of youth circus trainers - To improve the health & wellbeing and social, personal & life skills of participants - To develop and share effective methods of reaching out to marginalized youth - To promote social inclusion, solidarity & intercultural dialogue - To help young people with fewer opportunities to become more engaged & involved in society - To help young refugees become more integrated in their local community & connected to youth in other parts of Europe - To help youth circus organisations increase their capacity - To make funambulism a widely used innovative educational method in the youth & social circus sector and beyond This project has helped establish a methodology for teaching funambulism to young people in the participating schools and their local partner organisations (please see a best practice document attached). Thanks to the thorough training that the 12 youth circus tutors received there can be first funambulism workshops for young people bringing all the mentioned benefits to young people in Ireland, Belgium and Germany. This methodology will be disseminated to partner youth circus schools which are members of International Youth and Social Circus Network CARAVAN. funding for Level 2 training for the first twelve tutors to provide them with further training in funambulism and teaching in heights over four meters along with health and safety training and rigging. this was approved in April 2018 through the Irish national agency. And we are awaiting a funding decision to being 5 new partner countries into the project.