Issa Loyaan Farrah-Kelly shares his first experiences as a Creative Mentor and how he is working with his mentee, a fellow poet.
I applied to be a Creative Mentor with a sense of quiet trust, and enthusiasm…that I would be accepted, and was quietly overjoyed to be brought on board.
I found the training to essentially be a series of digestible, yet explicitly thorough, masterclasses in various elements of good practice of Creative Mentorship…delivered in a somewhat informal, yet explicitly professional manner. In a nutshell, I call my experience of the Creative Mentorship training practical philosophy.
I think there was a mutual/collective sense of excitement shared between myself and my Creative Mentor peers in training, all of us artists in various disciplines. My discipline is poetry.
This sense of excitement was, in my mind…practically, professionally and justifiably kindled by our mentors/coaches/trainers…Matt, Craig, Anna…and Jodie.
When I received word that I had been matched with a young poet, who wished to develop…it was as if abstract excitement, enthusiasm at being invited to share…insofar as I can….so much as I may understand about poetry etc…became solidified/crystallized…the Creative Mentorship role became real, and happily so.
My role is to support my mentee, which is an absolute pleasure…in developing poems over the course of 8 sessions, each session 1 hour long…held every fortnight after school.
My mentee wishes to write about their experiences of racism, which is unfortunately…a relevant, valid and important thing to be heard.
My mentee already has a sense of themselves as a poet, in a sense I consider myself jammy to have been matched with such a mentee.
Our sessions are basically conversational workshops, wherein we discuss poetry and work on pieces…under my mentee’s impetus, and I generally consider my role as being a sounding board/ideas person…making suggestions…never dictations.
I have a line of contact, via my mentee’s teacher, whereby I can ping ideas/developments etc, and receive them in turn.
I think it works quite nicely
Issa
The Southampton Cultural Education Partnership’s (SCEP) objective is to develop a cohort of Creative Mentors as local role models in Southampton, who will work directly with and inspire Children and Young People, including those from at risk, marginalised backgrounds or NEET (not in employment education or training).
The SCEP works to nurture creative and cultural education for all children and young people in the City. We are a consortium of organisations working together, in partnership with Artswork.
The SCEP’s Better Lives Through Culture Programme (BLTC) is part of a large-scale investment of over £130K by Artswork to support an ambitious two-year programme set to directly benefit hundreds of children and young people across the city and focuses specifically on engaging young people at risk of exclusion.
Creative Mentors, part of BLTC, is a paid training opportunity open to early career creatives in Southampton to develop mentoring skills and provide 1-2-1 support to young people aged 11 – 18 years. A dynamic cohort of practitioners, from a diverse range of artforms have been recruited and will be trained by SoCo Music Project to become Creative Mentors, developing their mentoring skills, knowledge and experience. Throughout the programme they will be supported to mentor a Southampton-based young person (mentee) to achieve their goals.
In partnership with Artswork
