Dr. Colm ? Cuanach?in:

Fighting Words was founded in 2009 by Roddy Doyle and Seán Love with the aim of empowering young people to write creatively and have fun with imagination and ideas while writing their stories. Our workshops, summer camps, projects, and publications are delivered from our headquarters in Dublin’s north inner city, and across the country with 20 Fighting Words outlets in most counties. This brings a strong focus between our arts centres, communities, schools and partners at a local level. More than 100 workshops per month are happening around the country and to date, 240,000 children have engaged with the Fighting Words programme at some level.

This experience is matched with a parallel programme around research. We are based at Dublin City University, DCU, doing research into the educational impact of arts and creativity on young people. We have produced a number of reports, which we have detailed in our written submission. In summary, we know that creative engagement in the arts bring benefits for young people in education, literacy, numeracy and oracy. More than that, there are significant beneficial outcomes from creativity in education that bring a range of advantageous outcomes for young people in mental health and well-being, for example, around resilience, confidence, self-efficacy and improved social, emotional, and communication skills. We are seeing positive outcomes when children are encouraged to express themselves, use their imagination and use their ideas. The sense of positivity and fulfilment that comes from being in that creative space has significant positive impacts for children.

Our programme includes creative engagement with marginalised and disadvantaged communities, minority communities, children with disabilities, those experiencing mental health issues and those with special educational needs. Crucially, everything that Fighting Words does is free of charge for schools, children and partners at every level. Our programmes are run at every level from early years to primary school to junior certificate and senior cycle and onwards with young adults. We purposely engage at all levels because one of the observations and facts arising from our research is that the space and time for creativity in the arts in the school system for young people shrinks as they grow through the school system. This was our experience as well if we think back to our own school days. That is a real challenge and something we must address. The benefits around mental health, well-being, communication skills, confidence and ability are all things that our teenagers and young adults need now. This needs to be supported.

Creativity and imagination have a fundamental and positive impact with well-being and young people are enabled to find their own voice and to express their own ideas, which can positively impact on their self-concept. In our research we find that it can be transformative. It can help young people to imagine different futures for themselves, where they can see themselves beyond their community, beyond their school, and envisage new lives for themselves.

Learning how to be creative improves students' achievements in schools. The opportunity to have their voice heard is particularly significant for students experiencing mental health issues. Observations from various stakeholders indicate a range of positive changes in participants' behaviour and attitudes. The research coming from the OECD or the significant research that was delivered by the World Health Organization, WHO, endorses this important connection between creativity in the arts and mental health and well-being. There is a positive response to creativity in education in Ireland, which has been endorsed by the Taoiseach and the relevant Ministers and all relevant Departments. We are also seeing significant projects such as Creative Schools with Creative Ireland, and with the Arts Council and others investing in schools and investing in education programmes. However, the research also shows there is a disconnect between the policy priority and the delivery of creative moments, creative play and creative activity in schools.

Looking to the future, one of the key points we would make is on teacher education. There needs to be a greater emphasis on: creative methodologies and participative learning in teacher education; the curriculum and curriculum space; and time for teachers to do these kinds of creative activities at every level through the school system.