Mediabox

Latest Funded Organisations

Mediabox recently announced the next raft of organisations that will share £872,141 of government funding.

53 youth organisations and media companies have been awarded grants for creative youth-led projects using a variety of media including photography, radio, film, online, print and advertising. To date, over 12,000 young people in England have benefited from Mediabox.

Successful organisations include:

The Stone Soup Project - Yooftube aims to tackle youth-centred issues by producing five news bulletins and broadcasting them on a web TV channel, (www.YoofTube.com) that can be linked to forum posts, Facebook, MySpace and Bebo. The bulletins will be factual but presented in a humorous and light-hearted fashion. The young people from Nottingham will have an opportunity to get involved in all aspects of setting up a Web TV channel.  They will be asked to manage budgets, production schedules, marketing and branding as well as gaining the technical expertise required to produce documentary style studio productions.

Invizible Circle Education – The Street Sounds Vol 10 project aims to challenge the stereotypes of 'urban' young people, and help to raise awareness and understanding of the diversity, positivity and creativity of our youth. It will explore cultural diversity and community citizenship issues as well as creating realistic and achievable routes into the creative industries. 35 young people from black and ethnic minority backgrounds aged 13-15 in Leeds, will be involved and become positive community activists. The group will create a film on their lives, pressures, attitudes and aspirations living in Leeds in 2009. The film will be screened at a launch event and exhibition

Hampshire Youth Options – Comparisons will involve 18 young people from three estates in Southampton, who with support from a local film company, will produce a series of short films about the different estates of Southampton.  The project will enable the young participants to express their views on the area and share their experiences with their peers across the city.  The project will aim to tackle issues around gang culture and rivalries between the different estates, as well as the role of alcohol, drugs and street violence in their day-to-day life.  

The Roundhouse Trust – Through radio, film and animation a group of 20 young people not in education, employment or training aged 16-19 years, will develop a campaign for the Roundhouse Turning Point Festival, September 2010. The festival's aim is to provide a platform for the positive voice of young people, by sharing stories that reflect a pivotal moment or turning point in their lives.The group will manage, design and create a campaign to communicate this positive message through radio podcasts and web teasers in the lead up to the festival.

The Five Lamps Organisation – Inside out will involve the production of eight short films, which allow young people 'to tell it like it is'. Through dramatic representation of their life experiences, young people will highlight some of the issues, which dominate their lives. The films will address themes such as the media's perception of what a young person should look like; teenage mums; young people with disabilities; the difficulties of trying to find a job and intergenerational issues, as well as challenging the often stereotypical view of young people.

Lincolnshire & Rutland Education Business Partnership - School's Sound will engage 30 disadvantaged young people aged 15 - 17 from the rural community of Spalding, who are identified as being at risk of becoming excluded from school. The young people will be given training in the use of outside broadcast equipment, editing and producing podcasts. They will then use these skills to produce a series of radio broadcasts about the issues that are important to them including transport, community cohesion and promoting local musicians, which will be aired on Tulip Radio.

Action Space London Events – London Speaks will allow a group of 20 young people with learning disabilities based in North and South London to create films documenting their life experiences. The project aims to communicate their feelings of exclusion, alienation and the fact that peers see them as being different. They are keen to demonstrate the valuable contribution they are able to make to society and communicate their hopes for a more inclusive world.

The North Londoners will be trained in digital skills, photography, storytelling, image manipulation and editing to produce a photomontage. The South Londoners will be trained in stop motion animation skills, storytelling and editing to produce an animation.

Userp Art Gallery – Metroland Media, initiated by young people at Usurp Art Gallery, brings together isolated teenagers including refugees new to the UK, Muslim girls of mixed origin and British born young people aged 14-18, to respond to the effects of increasing racist activity in Harrow. The project will allow the 21 young people, to create a diary style exhibition and DVD based on shared future aspirations. This will include sound recording, a photomontage, doodles and drawing, creative writing, video, and the productive use of social networking sites.

Theatre is… – The It’s Our Radio project will involve the creation of an Internet radio website hosting podcasts created by disadvantaged young people aged 13-19 in Hertfordshire. The site will provide a platform for young people to share their opinions and hopes for the world '10 Years From Now'. Participants will gain technical, journalistic and project management skills and be encouraged to complete an Arts Award.

Scotswood Area Strategy – This project, entitled Monkey, will see a group of young people will make a documentary film about the 'New Monkey Makina'- a rave music scene that is popular with youth in the North East. The joy of writing, performing rhymes and mixing records is an important part of many young people’s lives and they want to dispel the opinion that what they create and listen to is  'chav music', associated with drugs and violence. The group will make decisions on how the film is shot, who and where they interview and how the budget is spent. The project aims to involve a minimum of 150 young people.

White Lantern Film – Our New Forest will work with 30 young people with learning disabilities and utilise the medium of digital media to develop and produce two short films. The young people will work with mentors to develop and produce the two documentaries exploring their life in the New Forest, helping to break down negative stereotypes towards people with learning disabilities.

Heads Together Productions Ltd – The iWords project is a series of community radio broadcasts produced and presented by 35 young people aged 13 -19, from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, as well as BME, refugee and asylum seeker communities, all living in inner city Leeds.  The broadcasts will focus on different themes that young people have identified as important in order to promote discussion and debate among their peers. The programmes will be of a range of genres, including factual reporting, drama, creative writing and poetry.

Environmental Protection Department, St Helens Borough Council – Climate Crew is a climate change youth movement involving 10 schools in disadvantaged communities in St Helens. This will involve developing an online interactive game that simulates St Helens. The game will provide information and promote action within the local area and be linked directly to the real world through mobile phones and 2D barcodes, which can be located at recycling centres, bus stations and schools. The skills gained within the project will include creative skills (design, marketing and facilitation), project management, community leadership and computer game design and development.

LCET – Hear Me is a project that will involve the creation of five short films to help young people stop or reduce their self-harming. The films will cover topics chosen by 30 disadvantaged young people, aged 13-19, from Luton, most of whom have self-harmed.  These topics will include giving support and advice to those who self harm, and also help challenge the assumptions often made by others. The young people involved will train in the skills required to plan and produce the films.

The Tate – Comic Release will enable 30 young Londoners, aged 15-19 years, who are in or leaving care or from multicultural backgrounds, to create a series of viral video animations inspired by their own lives, including issues such as pressure to conform, do well at school, or caring responsibilities, all with a certain amount of humour. The group will be supported by experienced animators and artists to develop their ideas and the technical skills to realise them. Young people will lead on every aspect of the project as if they were members of the Tate Media production team. The finished animations will be broadcast online as part of the new Tate Channel in June 2010; they will launch the new Young Tate Online in July 2010; and will also be available on wider social media and distribution channels.  

People Express – Young, Gifted and Angry will support 28 young people aged between 13 and 19 including traveller communities, disabled young people, young people at risk of exclusion and young carers, to set up and manage their own film making clubs based in three isolated rural villages across Derbyshire. Supported by media professionals, each group of young people will write and create a film based on experiences of anger management issues, and what this means from the young persons point of view. The project will allow the young participants to gain an OCN or Arts Award. The groups will show their films in their village, schools and QUAD Cinema in Derby.

Community Music East Limited – The Young in Holt Debate project is based around an 'as live' TV show which will be designed, scripted, presented, staged and filmed by a group of 40 young people aged between 13 and 19 from a range of social and economic backgrounds in North Norfolk. The show will involve live debate around four themes, with selected panelists (chosen from a range of local figures such as teachers, Police, MPs or Councillors) and involvement from the audience of invited young people from around the county. The programme will then be broadcast on the internet.

Mouth That Roars – Coming of Age is a feature length ‘mockumentary’ that explores young peoples transition into adulthood. To create the film a group of 30 disadvantaged young people aged 13-19 will receive training in scripting, directing, acting, filming, production and editing and will manage the film process as well as organising and promoting a premiere at the British Film Institute (BFI).

Whitewood & Fleming – ‘Me and You – Life Books and Nano Diaries’ will create, in digital and book format, the diaries of 25 young people aged 13-18 who are in care in Cumbria, exploring their hopes, dreams, and giving them a voice. A group of young people will work alongside digital artists and practitioners to learn skills in film, photography and editing. The young people will also organise and manage a final celebration showing off their work.

Lauderdale House – Unity - 15 young people aged 13-18 years from the Castlehaven area of London will produce 20 live broadcasts and a radio drama using social networking sites as source material.  The young people, all of whom are either unemployed, socially excluded or live on a deprived estate, will plan, formulate, produce and broadcast their own radio programmes. The young people will research, write, direct, produce and act in the drama as well as learning radio techniques, using digital and mixing consoles, microphones and recording techniques, engineering and production skills and distribution using the Internet, podcasts and mobile networks.

Coombshead College – Cassiterides will allow 28 young people from Dartmoor and Newton Abbot aged 13-18 to make a ten minute film considering 'difference' and how uncomfortable and threatening it can feel when faced with people different to ourselves. The film, which the young people will script, act in, direct, shoot, edit, package and launch, will express their views about how fear and suspicion of other cultures can divide, whilst forbidden love brings together. Two quite different established youth groups (one rural, one urban) came up with this film idea during recent consultations. They want to explore, through writing and drama workshops, various responses to 'difference', 'oppression' and being 'occupied' by an invading force, for use in the film. They will use documentary source material, but the scenario will be futuristic.

Greater Manchester Arts Centre – Interact - The idea for this project was created by a group of young disabled people and young refugee and asylum seekers in Manchester who felt that the media focus too much on youth violence, knife crime and antisocial behaviour, and young disabled people are often portrayed as passive recipients of charity. This negative attention affects how people in their communities perceive them, which reduces their self-confidence and well-being. The young people want to challenge these negative perceptions by using their creative skills and interests in computers, gaming and social interaction to develop a creative project that will highlight their positive achievements, and showcase it at a celebratory event. The young people will work with artist collaborative The Sancho Plan to create an interactive audiovisual installation combining animation, sound and interactive technology, to create a fantastical world in which animated characters are triggered by electronic interfaces. The diversity of elements making up the project means it is particularly appropriate for the target group who have very diverse needs.

CoastNet – Our Coast Jaywick and Clacton - The coastal town of Jaywick is portrayed as a potential beauty spot spoiled by urban decay. A group of 20 disadvantaged young people form Clacton and Jaywick aged 13-15 will creatively produce a 10-minute campaign film about this deprived town in Essex, which they will present along with an exhibition and self-composed film score to their community.  They will look at major social issues, which have given Jaywick its reputation, interviewing a cross-section from their community and see what hope there is for a new beginning.  

Coneygre Arts Centre – Written Off – A group of young people who felt that they have already been written off as ‘no good’, will make three films in order to show that they want to change and can change. The project will bring together young filmmakers who have found that there were three things they wanted to let others know about and to use them to make people listen. The three films will be: "Message in a Bottle" looking at the effects that living with an alcohol dependant adult can have on a young persons life, "Playitback" about a group of young people with drug issues exploring "what if....." and "Imfamous" about a group of young Asian men who are addicted to behaving badly.

OFVM Film Oxford – Studio Live TX is a daily web based video magazine programme. The project will offer young people aged 15 – 19 professional training including studio, technical and journalistic skills, enabling them to create news stories and script and present live programmes. They will produce five programmes that will be streamed live on the Internet as a part of Oxfordshire's Summerscreen film festival in July. The programmes will also be shown at a cinema and made available to download.

The Message Trust – Hindley Life will be made up of four, week-long courses enabling 48 young people aged 13-18 from Hindley Young Offenders Institution to express themselves through film-making. All the young people are from deprived inner city estates and are unused to engaging with adults in a constructive way. Each group will devise a short documentary, exploring the life of someone (a person with a disability, an asylum seeker, a person who is elderly or a self-made entrepreneur) who has overcome a cultural or social barrier in order to achieve. The project aims to teach skills, raise aspirations and enable participants to empathise with those on the receiving end of prejudice and negative behaviours. They will plan, storyboard, film, interview and edit the films.

Media Skills Centre - will give a diverse group of 13-19 year olds from across London the chance to design their own video game ‘Save our World’. Designed and created by young people, the game aims to raise awareness of climate change and encourage people to recognise the effect that their environmental choices have on their community.

Germination CIC - will work with over 70 young people in Newham and surrounding neighbourhoods to make a film and poster campaign that breaks down barriers within the community. The young people will be divided into teams of six to create a range of campaigns and their final work will be posted on a website where the community can vote for their favourite.  

Focal Point Gallery  - 'Projection' will enable young people from Southend YMCA, Sanctuary Housing with Young Single Mothers, Royal Association of Deaf People (RAD), and Priory School to work with professional photographers and graphic designers to produce their own digital photographs. Their final work, which will be screened at a public event alongside billboards and posters in the community, aims to address the negative perceptions of young people in the area.

Inspired Youth - will work with 20 young people from the ‘Young Carers Revolution’ to create a media campaign that highlights issues facing young carers. The group will learn skills in digital photography, art and design in order to share their stories and challenge stereotypes. Their final work will be showcased in a conference facilitated by the group, and distributed in a resource pack to professionals, schools and the wider public.

Merseyside Youth Association ltd – ‘Count me in’ will address the challenges faced by young people who leave the education system, through a combination of documentary film, print and digital media. Working with 36 young people from the MYA Uplan scheme, the project aims to address questions including why young people leave education, how young people missing from schooling feel they are seen by their peers, their teachers and policy makers and how young people can be encouraged to reengage with schooling

BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art – will work with young unemployed people aged 16-19, from Fairbridge and BALTIC to produce the ‘Loud & Clear’ project. 34 young people will work with media professionals to create short films that present their views about disempowerment and explore their aspirations for the future. The final films will be showcased at a launch event at BALTIC in their own private cinema space.

Escape: Community Art in Action – will enable 32 young people aged 13-16 from rural Stratford area, many of whom are in care, and / or at risk of exclusion from school, to create their own video game. The participants will attend a series of professionally led workshops in order to develop skills in 3D modelling and image manipulation alongside hands-on experience in game-making and project management.

Trinity Centre  - will work with a group of young refugees in Newham to produce the film ‘Leave 2 Remain’. The project will equip young refugees with the skills and support they need to tell their stories and get their voices heard. The participants will work with industry mentors to develop their ideas learning skills from storyboarding, acting and directing to editing. The final film aims to tackle issues of prejudice and address mistrust in the asylum process.

New Writing North - ‘Walk the Line’ will enable a group of 30 young people aged 13 to 17 to make their own documentary film.  The group will learn skills including researching, story boarding and camerawork. The project aims to examine the link between anti-social behaviour and the lack of facilities in the area where young people can spend their leisure time constructively.  

Wolverhampton Arts and Museum Service – will work with over 15 students with a physical disability from Penn Hall School to explore issues of identity. Each participant will create individual pieces of work, from photography to documentaries and animations, which share their personal experiences of living with a disability. The project aims to break down the stereotypes surrounding disability and highlight the identity of individuals as opposed to their condition.

Eye Arts Club – ‘Stuck in the Sticks’ will be a feature film about rural isolation, created and produced by a group of 25 young people, many of whom have physical disabilities. The film will highlight the barriers to opportunities, including transport and lack of leisure facilities, available to young people living in rural Suffolk. It will demonstrate how young people can get together to improve the situation. The film will be screened in Eye Arts Club as well as at a council meeting of Mid Suffolk District, enabling the young people to be heard by their communities and decision makers.

Heart of the Forest Community Special School  - will work KS4 pupils from Heart of the Forest Community Special School to create the ‘Stay Safe’ project. The film will communicate personal experiences of bullying, address the various causes of bullying and the impact it has on individual’s lives. The film hopes to combat the prejudice and ignorance at the heart of bullying.

Mac – The ‘Plug In’ project will work with sixteen young people aged 15 and 16,
from St Paul's Community School in Balsall Heath, Birmingham to create a digital media project, using active barcode technology. Their final work, which will be showcased in a high profile exhibition, will give the young people a chance to share their personal stories with their communities.

Little Hearts Matter - The Little Hearts Matter Youth Council (LHMYC), a group of 8 young people, aged 11 to 17, who were born with only half a working heart, will create a documentary called ‘I've only got half a heart...understand me?’. The LHMYC have identified life at school as being the greatest challenge for young people with a life-limiting disability and would like to use documentary film as a way to explain their complicated condition to their teachers and peers. The documentary will accompany feature animations explaining the conditions and interviews with their peers, doctors, parents, and teachers, alongside a pamphlet to help ensure that hundreds of disabled young people are given the opportunities that they need and deserve.

Headliners (UK)  - will work with 40 young people, aged 14-18, from a mixture of backgrounds to produce four speech-based radio programmes investigating social problems such as sexism, bullying at school, myth busting around sexual health and how to manage your money correctly. The programmes will be broadcast on their own Internet radio station and distributed across other local platforms.

Global Education Derby – Young people from Derby Global Youth Action Project, many of whom have had to overcome significant issues in their lives including escaping gang culture and criminal activity, would like to share their stories through a documentary film. They hope to use media to encourage the people of Derby to join in the dialogue surrounding why there is division and conflict and what makes young people follow the wrong path. They hope that by sharing their stories in the ‘mine, yours, our journey’ film they can inspire other young people to turn their lives around, challenge the wider community's stereotypes of disadvantaged young people and make the community part of creating solutions.

Fitzrovia Youth in Action - 25 young people will work together to produce a Camden Youth Health Magazine.  The participants will receive training in project management, researching, copy writing, graphic design, and editing their own articles. Topics will include discussions about cultural dimensions on health, relationships, mental health and body image.

Eek Film CIC - Members of Glenburn film-club will produce ‘What About Us?’ a series of hard hitting commercials about Global warming, Species extinction, Energy Conservation and Recycling.  Glenburn serves a community with high levels of crime and unemployment figures, many young people there have low expectations of life. The project aims to empower young people with new skills, which develop their confidence and raise their aspirations.

World Film Collective – young people from a range of diverse backgrounds including those not in education or training and struggling in education will come together to produce ‘Make it-Film it!’ The documentary aims to address issues that can effect how young people view learning and education, including self-esteem, home life, community and peer-pressure.

Skimstone Performance Company Ltd – Will work with 20 diverse young people including those with learning disabilities, single mothers and those at risk of homelessness to produce the ‘Traces (Precious Rubbish)’ campaign. The campaign hopes to raise awareness about some of the ‘rubbish’ things that young people face in their lives, including prejudice and poverty, as well as the things that are precious to them and the traces that they leave behind.    
Bangladesh Youth Organisation, Newcastle – 32 young people will work with their families and communities to create a unique docu-soap. ‘Our Roots’ aims to explore the issue of assimilation for migrant communities by sharing the experiences of first, second and third generation Bangladesh families in Newcastle.  

Woodrush Community High School – ‘Because I'm Worthless’ will give 36 young people from across Worcestershire who face significant challenges in their lives, including drug abuse and eating disorders, to create their own film. The project aims to educate young people about improving their self-esteem and raising their aspirations. The film will be showcased in a screening to the local community and used as an educational tool across Worcestershire.

National Centre for Citizenship and the Law (The Egalitarian Trust) will give 10 young people aged 13 to 15 from Nottingham's most deprived areas the chance to create an animated film. The participants will learn a range of new skills including producing their own storyboards, schedule and scripts, creating, shooting and editing, marketing and event management.
               
Newcastle YMCA – ‘A vision for the future’ will enable 35 13-19 olds from the deprived estates of Byker and Walker to lead their own animation project about the kind of world they want to live in. The final animations will be presented and exhibited to Council Planners, Northumbria University architecture students, Northumbria Police and local decision makers.

Shropshire Council – ‘Breaking the Barriers’ will be created by a group of 20 young people in care called the ‘Care Council Crew’. The young people share their personal experiences of facing prejudice or bullying because they are looked after, in three short films. The films will show the truth about being in care, positive life stories, and what it is really like to live in a children’s home.

Youth Diversity Challenge (YDC) - 32 young people from South London will engage in a 45 hour training programme creating music videos exploring positive issues such as how to be an entrepreneur and how to get back into education. Their videos will be shown side by side at a community celebration event as well as at the young peoples’ schools, to show their teachers and classmates the positive activity they’ve been involved in.  

Ulfah Arts - 32 young people from a range of ethnic backgrounds will come together to design and produce the pilot editions of a brand new radio show ‘YOUTHOLOGY’. The young people will work with Take Part in three months of training in professional radio production and broadcasting, with support from former BBC Radio Network Producer Prashant Singh and Radio DJ Tessa Burwood. The young people’s final pilots will be aired on Rhubarb Radio, Birmingham.