Tailor-Made Work With Vulnerable Young People

Caught In The Act has always offered its work to pupils in non-mainstream settings such as special schools, pupil referral units, learning support units, young people in residential care homes and prisons. We have developed projects specifically for disaffected young people. These projects have included eight-week drugs awareness programmes; a Children In Need funded play about street crime and drama & music workshops as part of a Youth Offending Team diversion programme.

Caught In The Act's drama is designed to reflect its audience and reveal their behaviour, experiences and attitudes. The characters are recognisable and familiar and so immediately capture the audience's attention. Many young people in non-mainstream educational settings would not be comfortable in the formal setting of a theatre; so by bringing high-quality drama about young people like them into their classrooms, pupils get a chance to experience a professional performance that instantly grabs their attention.

Equality and inclusion are key issues for vulnerable young people. Already excluded from school, these young people are acutely aware of their difference from their mainstream peers. The use of carefully targeted drama and workshops lends a voice to a group of young people who rarely get heard as well as encouraging them to recognise the impact of their behaviour.

It is very important to have realistic expectations about the impact of any intervention when working with disaffected young people. Sometimes an indicator of success will be whether or not pupils stayed in the classroom and agreed to remove their coats and hats. Years of experience have allowed Caught In The Act to have an accurate expectation of behaviour for young people in pupil referral units, for example; this allows an easy relationship to develop between actors and pupils that encourages participation.

A recent study of arts activities (which included a Caught In The Act project) in pupil referral units by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (2005) concluded that "the skills that pupils develop through participation in arts projects are transferable to other areas of the curriculum and can help with a general re-engagement with learning."