News: National Youth Theatre announce a new initiative to create 60 jobs

National Youth Theatre has announced a brand new initiative that will create 60 jobs and provide access to drama for disabled young people across 15 schools. The Inclusive Practice Collective invites young people, specialist schools and colleges, plus cultural community partners in Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire to work with them.

Enabled by the government’s Kickstart Scheme, the National Youth Theatre have been inspired by young people engaged in their inclusion programme. It is an urgent response that offers creativity, connection and a boost for drama provision for disabled young people in schools.

At this time, it will also provide crucial jobs for young creatives facing unemployment.

Paul Roseby OBE, CEO and Artistic Director of National Youth Theatre, said: “Disabled people and all young people are most at risk of reduced opportunities post-Covid. Rising unemployment figures emphasise the urgent need for a social and cultural recovery that prioritises creative jobs, ensures accessible and inclusive opportunities and celebrates the diversity of British youth in all its forms and that’s exactly what our new Inclusive Practice Collective is designed to do.”

The Inclusive Practice Collective will create 60 new paid job placements for young inclusion facilitators aged 18 to 24, and will also facilitate two academic terms of regular inclusive theatre activity for disabled young people in 15 SEND Schools and Colleges initially in Greater Manchester, Leeds, Bradford, West Yorkshire and London. It will up-skill and support young inclusion facilitators with industry-led talent development, work with cultural partners rooted in their communities to connect the collective to existing programmes and future employment opportunities and  stage a digital festival for the collective celebrating inclusive theatre practice in schools and colleges and offer progression routes for young disabled people into the National Youth Theatre membership.

The collective marks the national expansion of NYT’s growing Inclusive Practice programme, which is designed to build the representation of young disabled talent within our membership and reduce barriers to accessing our opportunities. The collective, informed by SEND schools, will offer creativity, connectivity and opportunities for young disabled people within school environments.

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