ALL ABOUT US

Mission Statement:

We aim to make a positive difference in the lives of children and young people and to empower, raise confidence and give a voice to them primarily through the creative and performing arts. To support, nurture and raise their aspirations as individuals in order to help them be, not only rounded, contributing adults, but also successful ones.

Freedom Road Creative Arts (FRCA) is a new charity who offer young people in the Hull area workshops in Drama, Dance, Song-writing and Singing. We also have a band - Freedom Road- who perform at venues and conferences nationally and have brought out 2 CD's since it started in 2007.

History:

In 2002 the Rights and Rights and Participation Project, (RAPP), established with the support of Hull City Council and Arts in Health a drama group called the Platform Project. This ran until 2005 and proved to be a creative way of engaging with young people in care and it provided a positive outlet for them to express themselves.

Following work with the KANDU Project from Wiltshire in October 2004, RAPP decided to extend the remit of the drama group to include not only young people in care but young people in need or at risk and by using more art forms.

In late 2005 and in line with the Every Child Matters agenda, Iain Thompson took over as the Creative Coordinator and the Project was renamed Freedom Road Creative Arts and now incorporated workshops in drama, dance and song writing.

By 2007 several performances were performed such as Grease the Musical at NAPA's Studio 2 Theatre and singing group Freedom Road performed at the House of Commons as part of the Wilberforce 2007 Celebrations.

In 2008 Freedom Road Creative Arts was granted charitable status, however it still works very much in partnership with RAPP from whom it still takes its main bulk of referrals . Many of the young people who access the work of the charity have at some point received support and guidance from RAPP and many still do

In early 2009 Freedom Road visited Australia to perform at the CREATE Foundations Innaugral Youth Summit in Sydney and the drama group performed their version of the Lion King. In June FRCA began delivering a GCSE course in Drama in conjuction with Wyke College and in September thanks to funding from Youth Music, a group of young people organised and facilitated a music event which ran alongside the charities 2nd Summer School. All the groups are now working towards performances to be shown in December, which include Alan Ayckbourns' "GIZMO".