Youth Theatre – how to get them involved.

Convener(s): Martin McLean

Participants: Rebecca Hall, Amy Ip + 3 more.

Summary of discussion, conclusions and/or recommendations:

• Rebecca talked about Colchester’s youth project. Has several age groups. Setting up youth group can be challenging – set up a new group in Clacton but it failed through lack of numbers.
• One man talked about working with young people in Newham. Have a lot of interest there. Talked about one occasion when the drama leader actually went out on the streets to find young people and bring them along to the group.
• Martin talked about the challenges of running a youth project for Deafinitely Theatre. Tough because of targets set by the funders although there are enough young deaf people in London interested in drama to set up a group.
• Amy talked about working with a youth theatre group in Islington. Can be a challenge to keep young people coming to the group but she found that using discipline helps! She marketed at very specific groups such as the Chinese community through their newsletters. 
• A woman who worked for a company based in Liverpool talked about her experiences of setting up youth groups for Deaf and disabled young people. She is currently producing a guidebook for drama workshop leaders working with disabled groups.