TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Charis Charalambous
Performing their Story, was a project funded by the European Commission and the Bridge 47 Project. Bridge 47 - Building Global Citizenship (www.bridge47.org) is a project co-created and implemented by 15 European and global civil society organizations, aiming to contribute to a transformation towards global justice and eradication of poverty through Global Citizenship Education.
Performing their Story combined real-time Storytelling and Performance with Experiential Learning and Global Citizenship Education, bringing together an intercultural group of young persons (aged 18-35) with Cypriot and non-Cypriot origins, with the following aims:
Activating them through meaningful interaction with the purpose of sharing personal experiences regarding issues of glocal and global importance.
Building their confidence in discussing global topics, such as social justice, sustainable development, migration, human rights, environmental protection etc.
Creating new connections and relations between these peers, so that mutual understanding can take place, leading to reduced exclusion and stereotyping between them.
Developing awareness and sensitization on how daily life practices in Cyprus are connected to the rest of the world - the use of natural resources like water, their consumerist practices, their waste disposal.
Empowering Cypriot and non-Cypriot youth in presenting their identity.
Fostering critical thinking and promoting responsible citizenship and sustainable lifestyles.
Getting Cypriots (youth and general public) ready for potential future travel to developing countries and the realities faced by people there.
The project was based on 4 key concepts which the United Nations highlight as crucial for personal, societal and global sustainable development (both economic and non-monetary): The Performing Arts, Dialogue for Development, Peaceful Co-existence and Care for the Environment.
Rooftop Theatre Group was created with the purpose of using theatre as a tool for social change, mutual understanding and the creation of dialogues among the participants of its activities (workshops, performances and activist work) on local and European level.
The organizing team represented Cyprus, Spain and Sweden, while the team of participants represented Cyprus (both Greek-speaking and Turkish-speaking communities), Australia, Cameroon and Gambia. When exploring the identities of the members of the team, it was discovered that the participants had experiences of living and working in various countries, not just the ones they have citizenship of.
The training was based completely on non-formal methods, which had the purpose of helping the participants get to know each other, represent their expectations, represent their names, personal histories and identities, develop a team spirit, understand the realities of the developing world, create stories together, improvise, exploring their relation to key objects that were used in the street performance, creating text for the performance. The methods were also used to help the participants debrief and evaluate the activities.
The 3 main outcomes of the activity include the development of a public street performance, which took place on a busy pedestrian area in Nicosia on June 8th, drawing the attention of tens of people that witnessed it. The outcomes include the development of an e-book and a video documenting the development of the project and the transformation that took place in the participants. The training was considered a success based on the feedback given for the street performance as well as the evaluation given by the participants regarding the training overall.
The project was documented via social media: https://www.facebook.com/events/2334359493462547 and https://www.facebook.com/events/347323985926655/ and https://www.facebook.com/groups/2427838115/ (Rooftop Theatre Group).
I was involved as one of the main trainers of the project (together with 2 other trainers) in its conceptualization, writing of the (selected and funded) application form, design of the project, implementation and evaluation. I was involved full-time in the 5 days of the project (May 17-18, June 1-2, June 8, 2019), as well as in the preparation and reporting work done.