In TB2 of this year, students in the Department of Theatre on the Applied Theatre unit undertook Community Engaged Learning (CEL) projects that brought them together with external organisations Travelling Light Theatre Company, Bristol Refugee Rights, and the University of Bristol (UoB) Barton Hill Micro-Campus Little Library, collaborating with these organisations to design and deliver a series of creative workshops and performances for children and their families living in Lawrence Hill, Bristol.
In this post, Lauren Somerville, Issy Davy, and Ian Timoteo Franza – second-year undergraduate students taking the Applied Theatre unit – along with Mike Akers from Travelling Light Theatre Company and Dr. Jess McCormack, the Unit Director, reflect on their experiences and share their insights.
Project overview
Having previously run a successful CEL project, Jess wanted to build upon learning from the previous iteration of the project and further develop CEL in the Applied Theatre unit, working alongside Hannah Cowell, Engaged Learning Advisor. CEL offers opportunities for authentic assessment and ways for students to participate in the university’s civic mission. Thanks to funding from the University of Bristol Civic Engagement Team, they were able to work with partner organisation Travelling Light Theatre Company, based at the Wellspring Settlement in Barton Hill, to co-design an exciting project.
The Applied Theatre students initially worked with Travelling Light Theatre Company to identify and gain insight into specific challenges facing this organisation. Travelling Light provided a project brief for the students to respond to alongside a consideration of the company’s Core Values:
‘Valuing children and young people: we listen to and champion children’s voices and enable them to shape, create and define the work that we make.
The rights of the child: we believe that every child is entitled to opportunities to create, imagine and experience great stories told through theatre.
Because of this we actively aim to reach children, young people and families who wouldn’t otherwise be able to access theatre and creative opportunities.’
The students then worked with Travelling Light Theatre Company to design, publicise and deliver a Free Family Theatre Day for local families. The student groups also worked with Alice Freedman from Bristol Refugee Rights (BRR) and the UoB Barton Hill Micro-Campus Little Library team as they developed their ideas for what the Free Family Theatre Day would involve, how it should run and how they would invite and welcome local families to the day. The students worked in small groups to devise creative workshops and performances as well as taking responsibility for other areas including producing, marketing, front of house, health and safety etc.
Free Family Theatre Day
The Free Family Theatre Day was attended by many local children and families and the Applied Theatre students enjoyed facilitating the busy day.
Reflections
Lauren Somerville, Student
‘Travelling Light Theatre Company gave us a brief of identifying and gaining insight into the challenges that face their organisation as well as becoming familiar with their missions, and then designing and delivering a creative arts activity in response to their needs and proposals.
This brief initiated well-rounded research into Travelling Light’s aims; becoming familiar with these was a crucial stage in the early development of our project as their mission remained at the forefront of our conversations for the duration of the project to ensure that our work became the most beneficial for the community as possible. Overall, the Community-Engaged-Learning Project was an incredible opportunity to not only attend workshops and seminars that taught me about good facilitator skills and different communities around Bristol who participate in theatre, but to also apply this knowledge to a real-world community.
Having now experienced my very first community-based theatre project, I strongly believe that visiting and meeting staff at these organisations highly elevates engagement from both you and the community you are working with as you get to see first-hand their goals and the way they function within society. Putting into practice all the skills that I had garnered throughout the unit rather than just absorbing this information in the form of a lecture was invaluable in my personal development and my future approach to creating engaging, accessible theatre for a specific community of people. I thoroughly enjoyed this unit from start to finish and I look forward to utilising all the skills I developed in future projects!’
Issy Davy, Student
‘Unlike anything I had done before, I was able to learn through working with professionals and real people outside of our university context. From taking a lead in the marketing of the family fun day I was able to learn first-hand from Travelling Light Theatre Company’s Marketing and Communications manager, Jamie Harber, especially when considering the level of clarity and in-depth planning required when advertising an event such as ours.
This included making posters and designs for social media platforms, but it also involved a group of us attending an afternoon at the Little Library at the Barton Hill Micro Campus which acts as an after-school club for children and families in that area. By interacting with actual children in a community, we learned significantly more than anything books or the internet could teach us.’
Ian Timoteo Franza, Student
‘I am incredibly grateful to have been a part of something like this! In working directly with professionals in the field (including the excellent Mike, Lou, Jamie and Fifi from Travelling Light) and hearing their feedback on the work that my group created, my relationship with theatre and all it explores has most definitely grown. It was a wonderful opportunity as someone who also enjoys working with young children.
I especially loved working closely with Bristol Refugee Rights, who mentored a small group of us on how to market our Free Family Theatre Day to families in marginalized communities, advising us to think creatively and explore different ways of inviting and welcoming people to the day. Having greeting posters in multiple languages on the day of the event was a big priority of ours in making families feel welcomed and included. Following a suggestion from the staff at Bristol Refugee Rights, as part of the student Front of House team, we also explored having music playing that reflected the diverse diaspora of Barton Hill’s wonderful community as families entered. Bristol Refugee Rights was immensely helpful in mentoring us on how to not just provide families with a fun time, but to leave with a memory they will carry!’
Mike Akers, Creative Learning Project Manager at Travelling Light Theatre Company
‘Working with the Applied Theatre students was a great experience from start to finish. There was a very supportive dynamic within the group as a whole, along with an enthusiastic commitment to delivering a well organised event that would engage families in a fun and inclusive way.
On the day, because the students had organised themselves effectively and delegated responsibilities appropriately, the event ran very smoothly and attendees had a lot of fun in a relaxed, supportive and encouraging environment. The event itself was a real success (helped by wonderful weather) and the workshops and performances produced by the students, along with the wraparound activities like face painting certainly hit the mark with local families.’
Dr Jess McCormack, Unit Director
‘It has been great to engage with both the Engaged Learning Team and the Civic Engagement Team as part of this project. This project has provided a great opportunity to rethink curriculum design within the Department of Theatre. It has enabled us to explore new ways for students to engage with the city of Bristol, engage with and learn from local organisations and communities, and apply their knowledge to real-world questions. This project and unit have also opened out more space for students and staff in the department to engage in ongoing dialogue about how the university can make a positive impact locally, nationally or globally.
It has been brilliant to watch the students respond so well to a project that asks them to explore how they can participate in the civic mission of the university and explore their own role as active and creative citizens. The unit has received excellent student feedback with many students commenting that they have really enjoyed getting to know new parts of the city as well as thinking about ways that they might apply the knowledge they are developing as part of their wider course to real-world problems.
The CEL project was at the centre of the design of the unit and from the start of the unit students were asked to reflect on how the key values of CEL and some of the key theories of Applied Theatre related to each other. As part of the unit students explored four key themes:
- Imagination and Play: Theatre and Creative Arts with and for Children and Young People
- Creative Aging
- Theatre and Creative Arts and Health and Wellbeing
- Theatre and Creative Arts and Social Change
Alongside exploring theory and practices connected to these areas in workshops and seminars, the weekly timetable also included time to focus on the CEL activity and to take part in meetings with partner organisations etc.
It has been fantastic to work with Travelling Light Theatre Company this year. The students have learnt a huge amount from engaging with a range of staff from the organisation, all of whom have been so generous with sharing their knowledge, collaborating with the students on the project and providing detailed feedforward and feedback. The students have had the opportunity to develop a deep understanding of the company’s core values and talk to the staff team about the current aims of the organisation. The students have been inspired by learning about this organisation that have been working with children in the city since 1984. The student groups have also had the opportunity to develop their knowledge and understanding of other organisations based in Barton Hill and around the Wellspring Settlement. A group of students worked with staff from Bristol Refugee Rights in the initial and later planning stages of the project. Again, staff at BRR were so generous with their time and the students were able to gain insight into some of the challenges facing the organisation and to learn from the expertise of staff working with children and families as they developed their ideas for the Free Family Theatre Day. These conversations and this learning shaped the design and delivery of the day. A group of students also visited the UoB Barton Hill Micro-Campus Little Library to learn about what the team have been doing there and to meet some of the families, explore some creative activities with them and talk to them about the upcoming Free Family Theatre Day a great opportunity for the students to learn from the Little Library Team and to develop their understanding of some of the wider projects that are already running in the university.
It was such a joy to watch all of the ideas from all of these collaborative conversations come together on the day of the Free Family Theatre Day. It was a beautiful day full of creative games, songs, face painting under blossom trees in the sun, dancing, biscuits and fruit, laughter, lively performances and bravery shield making!
The students’ assessed presentations demonstrated the depth of learning that took place across the unit and I am excited to develop our approach to CEL in this unit and across the Department of Theatre.’
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