Tough Topics For Students' Theatre Skills
16 March 2010
(l to r) University of Derby students Abbie Petherbridge, Joanne Ellis and Sheli Kear rehearsing in the anti-racism play Frankie's Friends.
It's a wonderful opportunity for our students to be working in partnership with the community and making a contribution to others' learning.
”Ava Hunt, Senior Lecturer for Theatre Arts at the University.
Young women offenders, deaf children and teenagers concerned about racism are all getting more drama in their lives thanks to work by University of Derby students.
Third year students on the University's Theatre Arts and Creative Expressive Therapies degree courses are taking their acting skills into some unusual places, for four very different Theatre in Education projects.
These include:
- working with Heanor Gate Science College, in Heanor, to give a short play about racism in schools and host discussion groups with teenagers about the drama;
- acting workshops on the issues of violence against and by young women, organised through the Nottingham Youth Offending Team and Nottingham Junior Attendance Centre;
- staging scenes from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream for youngsters at the Royal School for the Deaf Derby, with signing interpreters working alongside the actors;
- giving a new twist to the classic children's story of The Hungry Caterpillar for Walbrook Nursery in Derby, where half the pupils have English as a second language. The actors will use Hindi, Gujarati and Urdu words as part of their performance.
The anti-racism play Frankie's Friends is being staged for different classes at Heanor Gate Science College this month - March. Four students play 11-year-old children, three white English pupils reacting to the presence of a fourth Middle-Eastern girl from an asylum seeker family.
Student Joanna Ellis, 21, originally from Gateshead, said: "The play asks people to look at things in a different way.
"Someone might have a negative view of other races or nationalities yet the mother of 'Maria', the Middle-Eastern girl, works scrubbing bedpans in a hospital and we hear one of the other characters say they'd never want to do that - but the mother is glad to have that job."
Teacher Scott Amott approached the University about staging an anti-racism play at the College.
He said: "This project helps promote the college's role in making sure our pupils are aware of the diverse nature of British society today and that they understand the problems some individuals may face in trying to integrate themselves into it."
Ava Hunt, Senior Lecturer for Theatre Arts at the University, said the other three innovative projects were also about taking drama out into the community. The students wanted to stimulate more interest in theatre and encourage people to think about using it to express themselves.
She added: "For example, our work with the Nottingham Youth Offending Team runs parallel to the huge Government initiative at the moment targeting violence against young women and by them, such as girls in gangs.
"We'll be working with young women who've had experience of both those things, and using drama to look at attitudes to violence and criminal behaviour.
"It's a wonderful opportunity for our students to be working in partnership with the community and making a contribution to others' learning."
Colin Parr, Attendance Centre Officer In Charge at the Nottingham Youth Offending Team, said: "It was great having the University's students here. They were a lively, engaged group who made a real connection with the young women who use our service.
"The project was quite different from the kind of thing we normally do here but we'd certainly consider doing something similar again."
For further media information please contact Press and PR Officer Sean Kirby on 01332 591891 or 07876 476103, or email s.kirby@derby.ac.uk
