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Dateline:21st December, 2005
A pioneering Refugee Training Programme developed by Lyric Hammersmith has recently been awarded the Home Office's top 5 Star rating and Beacon status. The training programme, called Flight Paths, enables exiled and refugee artists to overcome the multiple barriers they face in obtaining work in the UK by providing them with training to become arts-in-education practitioners. In making the award of Beacon status the Home Office said, "This is a fantastic project that has achieved everything it set out. The project is fully efficient. It has a number of robust partnerships, it has robust monitoring systems, and the outputs reflect value for money." Flight Paths began in 2001 when Lyric Hammersmith and Greenwich and Lewisham's Young Peoples Theatre (GLYPT) met to address a demand from schools; talks with teachers showed a lack of suitably qualified practitioners to reflect the ethnic diversity in classrooms, particularly from refugee communities. The Flight Paths programme includes a two-day training course and up to ten days work experience, delivered in partnership with other organisations across London including Oval House, GLYPT, Green Candle and Cloth of Gold. Training is provided on a one-to-one basis with an experienced practitioner, and carried out in schools learning "on the job". The programme has now created a database of trained refugee artists that is available to other arts-in-education employers across London. Flight Paths has been phenomenally successful - working with thirty artists and reaching over 1,500 children. Since the start of the programme 21 artists have found employment as professionals in schools or in educational projects with community groups. Lyric Hammersmith Education Manager, Eric Dupin said, "The artists we've had on the training programme are very special. As a group, they're creative, inspiring people, who set a standard. Each in their own way has enriched the lives of children, their mentors and the companies with who they've been in contact. We're proud of the programme's achievements to date and look forward to this new network of professionals making a real contribution in the future." One of the refugee artists is Suzana Tamamovic, formerly of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Suzana participated as a trainee in 2003/4, went on to work successfully as an artist in 2004/5 at schools in Slough and Kidbrooke, and is now using her skills and experience to mentor a trainee in the current programme 2005/06. Suzana said, "The reason Flight Paths is such a great programme is that it actually takes into account participants' individual needs, listens to their feedback and learns how to improve each year. As someone who has taken part in a few different training programmes aimed at refugees, I was happy to finally take part in one that delivers on its promises. Making an ultimate move from being a trainee artist in 2003 and becoming one of the mentors in 2005 shows the level of trust organisers have in their artist as well as the very high standard of training they provide. The project has also been recognised as a model of good practice by Arts Council England for the way each participant receives tailored training to suit their individual levels of skills, knowledge and confidence. |A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M|N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z| Please note that all three Archive indices are very long and will therefore take some time to download.
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