A drama therapy workshop of the “MEDART – Methods of Education for Disadvantaged Adults Rooted in Theatre” project was held from the 1st to the 7th of July 2016 in Lanzatore (Spain). The project is funded by the “Erasmus+, Key Action 2 – Partnerships Strategic Education for Adults” programme and involves 8 partners from 8 countries: apart from the Centre for Creative Development “Danilo Dolci”, the partnership consists of Divadlo Bez Domova (Coordinator – Slovakia), Acta Community Theatre (United Kingdom), Teatr Grodzki (Poland), Asociacion Acunagua (Spain), Drustvo ProSoc (Slovenia), MVKBP (Hungary), Stichting Hogeschool Rotterdam (Netherlands). The whole partnership has as a common denominator a strong experience in theatre – in the field of drama therapy in particular – and the use of non-formal education techniques within their projects that make use of theatrical methods. All partners have also had experience in EU projects and in the training and inclusion of people belonging to disadvantaged groups.
The meeting in Lanzarote gave the chance to share the theatrical practices of the seven partners working with theatre for the social inclusion of homeless people, migrants, people with mental and physical problems. An intense week of methodologies, practices and techniques during which each partner presented two or more methods for working with the target group.
The presented methodologies will be included in the Methodological Guide that the MEDART consortium will deliver in the coming months. Lanzarote also was the decisive moment to discuss the final structure of the Methodological Guide and organise the next phases of the project.
The Methodological Guide is designed to give innovative tools to all those operators who use theatre to promote the employability of disadvantaged people such as homeless people, marginalised youth, migrants and people with few opportunities. The consortium decided to include 28 drama therapy methods in the Guide, 4 for each partner with direct experience in the field.
The general objectives of MEDART are:
- improving the knowledge, skills and abilities of professionals and social workers who work with disadvantaged adults as homeless, migrant, disabled, using the techniques of theatre as a tool for social inclusion;
- to create a manual collating methods from the individual partners in the work for the empowerment of disadvantaged adults through drama therapy techniques that will be tested during the implementation and they will become the basics of the drama therapy manual which will become a valuable aid for all social workers working with theatre and disadvantaged adults.
Next meeting will be in Bratislava in late November 2016. On this occasion there will be an international conference to present the project and it will be possible to participate in the ERROR festival, one of the most important festivals in Europe for social theatre which will run from November 25 onwards.
For further info, please contact CSC project coordinator, Dario Ferrante dario.ferrante@danilodolci.org