Change The Story 2
A Youth Empowerment Digital Storytelling Project Evaluation Report
project brief A ten-month youth empowerment project, employing filmmaking as a tool for personal expression and democratic participation Change The Story engaged a group of 30 young people aged 15-21 years old in a series of storytelling, filmmaking workshops, encouraging them to find their voice and explore their creative visions through short films. The project was delivered in partnership with Space 2 youth centre and included filmmaking workshops, film screenings, group discussions, mentoring opportunities and a final project celebration/ screening event. The project was funded and supported by The Wellesley Trust Fund, Community Foundation and The Big Lottery Fund, allowing Bridge + Tunnel Voices to deliver a long-term, empowerment project that is invested in personal growth, teamwork and personal expression. PAGE 02
executive summary Change the Story engaged an initial group of 30 participants, aged 15-21 in a series of filmmaking workshops. Project beneficiaries were identified by organisational partner Space 2 youth centre, providing learning, creative and skill-development opportunities to young people in the area of Newcastle Upon Tyne. Support for this project allowed Bridge + Tunnel Voices to develop and deliver a successful community engagement filmmaking workshop where young people who have limited access to creative and educational opportunities were trained and engaged in filmmaking activity, allowing them to express their unique voices through unique artwork, imagined, actualised and produced by them in collaboration with our creative team. Participants were trained in the following areas: storytelling principles, story development, story boarding, script writing, production scheduling, camera training, sound recording, editing. Furthermore, advise on distribution, presentation and appropriate meta-tagging was offered in order for them to share their work via dedicated social media networks.
Our role throughout this project was solely that of an instructor/facilitator; the energy and stories captured in this video belong to the young filmmakers. This project has been a huge success in engaging a group of young people who have been excluded from formal education to genuinely engage in this filmmaking programme through which they acquired new skills, self-confidence and a total of ten young people has expressed their interest to further pursue creative media training. This project could not have been accomplished without the support of our funders. Fundraising is already in place for a future phase for Change the Story where the initial group will also participate in recruitment ensuring that a larger number of beneficiaries can benefit from such activities.
Nelly Stavropoulou, Director of Bridge + Tunnel Voices
The project concluded with a public screening of the produced film that allowed participants to take ownership of the work, perform the song they composed and to emphasize the ethos and message of their music group, ‘The Warm Collective’.
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Self-empowerment through creative production Arts institutions provide individuals with an alternative, safe and open space for them to experiment, learn more about themselves, discover where their strengths lie and build on these to develop their confidence. The personal attention they receive when doing this facilitates the growth of trusting relationships, teamwork and a respect for others and themselves. All of this gradually engenders a new attitude towards themselves and others. This project produced a Code of Good Practice that is designed for community artists engaging with at-risk youth. Here is a brief summary of its key points and primary objectives:
Aims
Objectives
To cultivate personal confidence,
Encourage self-expression and open, non-judgmental dialogue between artists and participants, and amongst participants.
development, self worth and social skills. Provide them with a safe space in which they can express themselves. Give the participants artistic and social skills sets. Teach them in a way that enables them to continue to use the skills autonomously following the workshops.
Help them to feel in control of their lives. Ensure individuals feel listened to, and that they and their skills level are fully understood.
Foster partnerships and organise workshops and collaborative projects with a wide range of local and national arts, education and criminal justice organisations. Gradually give the young people more agency when engaging in dialogue about personal social change and in their artistic practice. Facilitate interaction with people who have gone through the same problems, (have offended, or were at risk of doing so) and who are now more stable, confident and back in work, education or training.
project testimonials “At each stage, it was their decision making which drove these projects. We are also heartened by how they took to the project and it was great to see them continuing to make films in their own time once we had left. Their sense of achievement and their pride taking part of this project will stay with me for a long, long time. These are young people who are often forgotten and rarely have access to the tools to make their voices heard.” - Tina Gharavi, Director & Filmmaking Mentor “Our primary role within this process was to create an environment in which young people felt free to express themselves, without fear of ridicule or failure. The group have now seen that visual media can be used to influence and change lives. Our aim has been to change perceptions. We have helped to change the way these young people see us, and the way they see each other. All that’s left is to change the way the world sees them.” - Jamie Korn, Director of Photography & Video Editor Mentor
“Change the Story has allowed me to engage with a group of young people who not only were trained in filmmaking production but most importantly were transformed throughout this process through re-investing in themselves, and using film as a tool to project their voices and share their experiences with others. This project could not have been supported without the support from the Big Lottery Fund that allowed our team to deliver a succesful youth empowerment project that is invested in structured and long-term skills acquisition and we hope this will be only the beginning of a bigger project. - Nelly Stavropoulou, Project Manager & BTV Director “It was great fun to produce our own film and to be able to tell our story in our own words.” - Nicy, Workshop Participant & Young Artist “Thank you for the opportunity to tell my story and to talk about what makes...ME. We are all made of stories and those stories unite us and create a warm collective.” - Walter, Workshop Participant & Young Artist
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project evaluation The project has succeeded in: - Involving participants in leadership, decision-making and creative agency - Offering participants the opportunity to engage in dialogue with one another, contribute life-stories, work with others and explore their creative vision - Offering participants the opportunity to learn from and work with industry professionals and to create their own unique artwork The project engaged: - A total of 30 participants with a core group of 15 young people - A creative team of 4 film production professionals - A total of 4 project volunteers (students and young professionals) The project delivered: - 35 master-classes - 4 storytelling tutorials - 8 production days - 5 video editing sessions - 2 private film screenings - 4 debate sessions The project produced: - A unique music video through a creative synergy between professionals and young people - A learning resource inspired by the project’s ethos to
be distributed as guide for artists collaborating with
at risk young people
- A project-dedicated website amplifying the impact and legacy of the project: www.changethestorybtv.wordpress. com/change-the-story/change-the-story-phase-two/
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