“Delivering the spectacle that will be 2025”

Thursday 8 September 2022

Rotherham Civic Theatre - Rotherham

A team of creatives are helping to gear up and prepare Rotherham for a “world’s first” year of celebrations like no other. But key to that success is engaging effectively with the children and young people who requested a Children’s Capital of Culture in the first place - enabling them to be the driving force.

The SYCCIN event held at Rotherham’s Civic Theatre focused on engaging young people in creating culture for future generations. Attended by more than 45 creative practitioners, the breakfast event also allowed for plenty of networking over food and drink.  

Kickstarting the session, Sarah Christie, Programme Manager for Children’s Capital of Culture 2025, explained that the year of celebration is set to be “a world’s first” made by, for and with children and young people at every stage - with arts, culture, creativity and community events running throughout the year. 

“Underpinning this is work that has already begun, with key programmes that will deliver the spectacle that will be 2025. This centres around skills, talent and inclusive growth,” Sarah explained. 

Firstly, there is a schools development programme already underway to “develop the talented workforce of the future, enabling more people to go into meaningful careers in the creative and cultural industries.” This includes mentoring, shadowing, taster sessions, work experience and training. 

Secondly, a social and cultural wellbeing programme is now being rolled out to restore confidence, civic pride and community bonds across Rotherham. “There will be lots of creative programming that will be made by and with children and young people, so they're creating a culture that's made in their own image,” said Sarah. 

Creating positive change

“The reason that it’s happening here is because it's what children and young people in Rotherham want.” She highlighted how a three week intensive summer programme run by Grimm&Co in 2017, involving a group of 32 young people, outlined the things that children and young people wanted to see happening in their towns and the experiences they wanted to access. “It became really apparent that children and young people in Rotherham were very passionate about where they were from, and they wanted to create positive change,” said Sarah. 

Lastly, there is a young producer programme for 16-25 years olds, with many people doing paid placements in creative and cultural organisations across the borough. “During their placements, they got on the job experience of working in a busy cultural organisation and they also got to oversee creative projects end to end,” said Sarah.  

Christopher Badger, a young producer who had his placement at Kollider, said he felt lucky to be selected to work on interesting projects where he gained valuable project management experience too. “I think what's really important about the Children’s Capital of Culture project is that it's making a real permanent change. As young producers, you get really invested in seeing projects in your town grow. 

“We had a heavy workload to manage but what I really enjoyed was that I had a great team around me who, together, were happy to get on with things and deliver,” he explained. 

Young producer Mitchell Nuttall said from the outset, the programme was “amazing” because “we were all talking about what could we do? How can we achieve this? What should we create? We were creating art events, exhibitions and festivals before we even started the job.

“And that just speaks to the power of what the job is. Imagine what we achieved throughout our contract - we achieved so much! I learned so many skills that I thought I never would. In part because I daren’t try beforehand. But this job gave me that opportunity.” 

Mitchell said he had gone from being able to take part in performance to creating his own  “because I now know what all the logistics are and who we have to talk to.”

Empowering the next generation to be the cultural “change makers”

Dr Becky Parry, who leads creative work with and for children and young people, is currently undertaking a project outlining skills for children and young people. 

She said: “My starting point always is remembering that children and young people are always experts in an area of their lives. We often ask them to be experts in things that we're interested in, but actually, they've always got a favourite sport or they've got a favourite game for example. 

“They have expertise and we sometimes ask them to make comments and contribute to discussions about things that are just not as relevant to them.  We have to listen to what they are interested in.”

Meanwhile, Carly-Ann Clarke, director at Chol, a children and young people’s theatre company based in South Yorkshire, said it was crucial to make sure that everyone’s contribution is valued. She discussed how a storytelling project was successful because of the engagement from those who were not only imagining but also participating in the programme. 

Dr Deborah Bullivant MBE, educationalist and social entrepreneur who founded Grimm & Co, said it was essential to give young people a voice to champion things in their own town and be “the change makers” for culture. She shared how this had a particularly positive impact  when young people were empowered to play their part in a manifesto for change, which gave them real ownership.

“It’s really important that we put the voice of the children at the forefront. We can be the vehicle but that’s the only part we play,” she concluded. 

This session, held on September 8 in Rotherham, was the final one of the SYCCIN pilot project. Keep an eye out for further announcements in the future.