Sarah Girling, Freelance Project Manager

Island creative friends, do follow the IW Creative Network for more info.

Very proud to have played my part in this project, helping to get around 600 children and young people in Southampton through their Arts Award Discover (through a pandemic!).
The next stage is very exciting as the research team analyse the data, leading to help make Southampton a child-friendly city.

NEWS!
Very excited (and a bit sad) to say that I’ll be leaving Freelance work and joining the staff at the Isle of Wight Steam Railway at the end of November, becoming their Museum Manager.
We were at Havenstreet today, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Steam Railway alongside staff and volunteers who made me feel incredibly welcome.

Today I traveled across the Solent to see my friends at the University of Southampton. It was a great opportunity to work with Dr. Ronda Gowland-Pryde and Jen German (was Harris) to view some of the work produced by children and young people in Southampton with artists Faye Philips, Nazneen Ahmed and Natalie Watson, as part of the Connecting Culture project.
This project could not have launched at more difficult time, the start of a global pandemic, but we’ve worked hard to deliver 20 workshops for well over 300 children and young people, who achieved 300+ Arts Awards. And we haven’t finished- I’m talking to 3 more secondary schools to try to achieve the aim of getting both a geographical spread as well as a spread of ages.
All of this work will then be handed over to University Researchers to analyse the data and make sense of it, answering questions about what children and young people think about culture and creativity in Southampton!

Very excited that the partnership which I coordinate alongside Isle of Wight AONB and The Island Collection has been awarded £100K for the Creative Biosphere project, starting this Autumn. We’ll be working with 5 cultural organisations, 5 artists and 5 secondary schools.

£100,000 funding boost for ‘Creative Biosphere’ Project The project will see five creative practitioners embedded in schools in Ryde, Ventnor West and Newport

Island friends, aged 18-30 and a young creative?

Are you a young creative aged 18 – 30 on the Isle of Wight? Young creative people on the Isle of Wight aged 18 - 30 are invited to be part of Stonecrabs Theatre Playdoh: Young Directors Festival 2021.

The new IWCEP teacher newsletter is out now!

IWCEP Teachers News: June 2021 Isle of Wight Cultural Education Partnership’s newsletter for teachers, for June 2021.

I’ve had such a lovely day, and it’s not over yet! This morning I was at the beautiful Carisbrooke Castle with a Y6 all female class from Barnet, teaching ‘Who lives here?’ They were a fabulous group, so engaged.
This afternoon I was planning a new website which is very exciting. I’m obviously not a web developer but I’ve made a few over the last few years and I’m quite proud of them.
This evening is the first meeting of the Isle of Wight Story Festival trustees… and I am one of them!

Just visited a school for the first time in forever, running a focus group on music ensembles for the Isle of Wight Music Hub. The children a) enjoyed it and b) asked if I was coming back to do another! High praise indeed…

I couldn’t agree more!

If you have 20 minutes, do have a listen to a podcast that Megan Stisted (Lift the Lid project Creative Apprentice) and I gave to Voice magazine

Young Creatives We visit Manchester and the Isle of Wight to hear how organisations support and empower young people to start exploring the creative industry, and how youth voice impacts project delivery and the direction of an organisation.

What a creative opportunity!!!

Love building in Minecraft? We've got a dream job for you, but be quick The hunt is on for a Minecraft whizz to create an exciting new feature and you could earn £500. The deadline to apply is midnight on Sunday, so get building and best of luck