Secondary Schools: Youth at Risk

In 1998 Saothair Ealaíon undertook a pilot project on behalf Páirtíocht Ghaeltacht Thír Chonaill / MFG, Údarás na Gaeltachta and Donegal County Council.

This was one of several schemes to highlight and respond to Youth at Risk, working with students who might be at risk of terminating their education early. In art, there is no right and wrong and hence little risk of failure. Because, at this level, it relies on intuition more than learned skills, art workshops can be of benefit to students irrespective of academic aptitude.

Five secondary schools in the Gaeltacht participated. The artists spent a week in each school conducting art workshops with an average of 30 students per workshop.

 

Workshop Aims

• To act as facilitators, encouraging students to have initiative and strengthen idea development
• Build confidence and improve self-esteem
• To create self respect, respect for others and for the work of others
• To create situations in which the students worked together, in groups
• To encourage visually impressive large-scale pieces of two or three dimensional work
• To place an emphasis on Design and Experimentation as opposed to Picture making, obviating the need ‘to be able to draw’
• That the work should be enjoyable

Working in groups helped to break down the normal classroom format which tends to involve students working on their own and minimised the feeling of segregation for those who do not work as quickly as others. It also developed skills in co-operation and communication.

Being part of a group making a piece of sculpture or a mural encourages skills in decision making and planning and helps to foster the idea that working together often achieves the most impressive results. Large pieces of two dimensional and three dimensional work on permanent display heightened the sense of achievement for the students. They were genuinely amazed and impressed by their own work.