Context: This project is targeted at children and young people in formal and non-formal settings to retell stories of resilience during COVID 19 in four locations: London, Cumbria, Turkey and Slovenia. With young people at the helm, we will be working to uncover stories of lesser-heard people in our communities, reinterpreting them into arts performances, and touring the work in cultural institutions (theatres, galleries, libraries, heritage sites…) across the four locations. Objectives: - To amplify the voices of those from lesser-heard communities with particular focus on their experiences of COVID 19 - To skill up school children in the arts and creative industries towards nurturing an interest in the arts as a viable career option - To uplift cultural organisation hard-hit by COVID 19 by reconnecting them with their communities and drawing audiences to them Participants: Each partner will work with 20-30 school children from communities with unmet needs depending on our contexts. CDEC will work with young farmers, GLL will work with children living at the intersection of poverty and racialisation, DeM will work with child refugees and Povod will work with the Roma community. Each of our organisations will also partner with three venues where the work will be toured. Activities: The project will work with young people as community leaders through the arts by training them to - - Organise and facilitate workshops with marginalised communities - Conceive, write and produce performances (storytelling or short plays) - Collaborate with cultural organisations by project managing the performances when they go on tour Methodology: This project brings together inclusive pedagogy and experiential learning to create a cycle of knowledge exchange between project partners, cultural organisations, schools and young people. By promoting creative, arts-based education using the real world as our classroom, we envision coproducing with our young people and cultural partners a dynamic learning experience that is relevant and applicable in different contexts. In the spirit of social inclusion, we are interested in exploring what it would look like to build a performances from the bottom up through an inclusive process -- that is, by involving young people who are experts in their own lives leading the gathering and creative process involved in identifying and telling the experiences of the pandemic. Impact: The creative sector which is being heavily hit by COVID will be at the heart of the work, with children and young people drawing audiences to venues through these performances. This will deepen relationships between cultural organisations and local communities with unmet needs. Long term benefit: This project plugs the hole by enthusing a generation of children from deprived backgrounds with the skills, joy and enthusiasm for the arts as a viable career option.
Our project had the following intended objectives: - To amplify the voices of those from lesser-heard communities with particular focus on their experiences of COVID 19 - To skill up school children in the arts and creative industries towards nurturing an interest in the arts as a viable career option - To uplift cultural organisations hard-hit by COVID 19 by reconnecting them with their communities and drawing audiences to them
STORYsilience was a response to the global pandemic and the disproportionate impact it has had on marginalised young people and creative arts. It was built around the knowledge that resilience, emotional health and wellbeing are of paramount importance to rebuilding communities to be stronger, more cohesive and more empathetic; and that engaging with the creative arts - theatre, exhibitions and productions- supports the development of key skills and competences for the 21st century. The STORYsilience project was focused on developing the skills, access and inclusion of marginalised young people through creativity and the arts. Our project addressed dual needs: 1. Those of marginalised young people- "...the impact of the pandemic on young people to be systematic, deep and disproportionate. It has been particularly hard on young women, younger youth and youth in lower-income countries. Young people are concerned about the future and their place within it" and focused on "employment, education, mental well-being, rights and social activism" (www.ilo.org/publuns). 2. The impact of COVID on the creative sector, which was impacted across the globe, in relation to sustainability, connection with audiences and the ability to rebuild.