Author: Yvonne McLellan

Fair Access Expo: Community and Applied Arts Practice

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Fair Access Expo: 

 Community and Applied Arts Practice 

Friday 7 June, 10 – 3:30pm at The Boardwalk, Glasgow G1 1TF

Are you aged 16 – 25 and want to use your creativity to ask questions, share stories and make change? Do you think the arts can change people’s minds, opinions and lives? Are you interested in building leadership and facilitation skills? If the answer is yes, come along to find out more about Community and Applied Arts Practice at our Fair Access Expo.

At this exciting all-day event, we’re inviting you to join practical sessions with experienced community artists to:

  • Make Theatre
  • Get Moving
  • Make Music
  • Tell a Story

They’ll share their skills and show you how they work creatively with a range of communities. Come and learn about the stories that matter.

What is Community Arts Practice? 

It’s a springboard to careers in teaching, directing, performance making, youth work, community music, arts in health and wellbeing, community education, play work, arts funding, creative learning in arts and cultural organisations and so much more.

How to register

To register, please visit the Eventbrite event page where you can sign up as a young person to attend, or as a teacher to book for a group of pupils.

Ticket like button for registering

Who can attend

Fair Access prioritise places for young people aged 16 – 25 who are facing barriers in accessing the arts and who meet one or more of the following criteria:

Get in touch if you have any questions or need us to check a postcode for you.

If you are a young person living very rurally (e.g. on an island) you may also be eligible. Please get in touch with us and we will let you know if you can apply.

Note to teachers

If you are a teacher, we encourage you to attend this opportunity with your pupils. If you cannot attend, we ask that either an alternative member of staff accompanies the group, or that the students are passed on the booking link in order to book themselves a place. This will enable us to collect the details we require from the young people attending to be able to run the event effectively.

Contact Us

You can contact the team at waci@rcs.ac.uk

Come and Try: CLPL Sessions for Teachers

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Come and Try: 

 CLPL Sessions for Teachers 

Wednesday Evenings in May 2024

Two people discussing a script onset A conductor practicing his score with an ensemble Dancer in a studio practicing

WACI are delighted to be offering three new Career-Long Professional Learning (CLPL) sessions for secondary teachers this coming May:

All sessions are free and take place at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Aimed primarily at secondary teachers who work in schools with large catchments of SIMD1 areas, you can find out more and sign up by clicking the links above. 

 Contact Us 

If you have any questions about these activities, please email: waci@rcs.ac.uk

Introduction to Animation

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Introduction to Animation 

Mondays Evenings in February – May
5pm – 6:30pm

Young adult wearing pop art shirt with bobbed hair

Where: Online  Cost: Free
Dates: 26 Feb, 4, 18, 25 March, 22, 29 April, 6 May

Do you live in the East of Scotland and would you like to learn about the art of animation, explore various digital creative tools and create your own animation project? Join our engaging animation and storytelling workshop series. It is perfect for beginners and is free to attend.

Throughout the course of three months, you will be able to develop your own stories and animations through a series of workshops. Workshops will cover different aspects of animation, such as:

  • storytelling
  • creating animated comics
  • developing characters
  • production

We will also cover the following for animation and film:

  • music
  • sound effects
  • voice-overs

Exploring a range of techniques and tools, this course will be a great opportunity to explore your creativity through an understanding of the animation process.

Please note: WACI works with those facing barriers in accessing the arts, such as those:

This project will also prioritise those living in the East of Scotland.

Contact us: If you have any questions or queries, get in touch with the team at waci@rcs.ac.uk

WACI X RCS Summer School Scholarships

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 SUMMER SCHOOL SCHOLARSHIPS 

Now Open for Application

WACI are delighted to announce that our scholarship programme for RCS Summer Schools is now open for applications. The RCS Summer Schools have something for everyone. Whether you’re a beginner or more experienced, you can apply now to take part.

Young people playing strings in an orchestra

Summer School Availability

There are a whole variety of summer schools to choose from in Dance, Drama, Music, Film and Production. Visit the RCS Summer Schools website here to see the selection of courses you can choose from. Some of the courses are very popular and spaces fill up quickly. The scholarships are selected at random and based on the availability of places on each course. A WACI scholarship will cover the full cost of your chosen course.

Alongside the Summer School Scholarships, WACI can offer some financial support to assist with travel and accommodation costs for those with a WACI Summer School Scholarship who live in rural areas of Scotland.

How to apply

Fill out the application form to let us know:

  • a little bit about you
  • why you would like to do the course you have chosen

If it would be easier, you can provide a voice recording or video statement in support of your application.

Deadline: Wednesday 1 May, 12 noon

Please Note

WACI will prioritise those facing barriers to accessing the arts such as those:

Get in touch and we can check your postcode for you. 

 Contact Us 

If you have any questions about this activity, please email: waci@rcs.ac.uk

Fair Access Ambassadors At A School Near You!

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Fair Access Ambassadors 

 At A School Near You 

Visiting Schools Across Scotland

Two senior pupils holding RCS leaflets

Our Fair Access Ambassadors are an energetic posse of young people. Already part of Transitions or Widening Access to the Creative Industries, they are helping us spread the word about Fair Access in their schools and communities.

Our Ambassadors have a love and passion for the production or performing arts and are determined that other young people from Fair Access backgrounds have the same opportunity to get involved. Ambassadors meet several times over the year to plan campaigns in partnership with Fair Access and then put these into action with our support.

This year the Ambassadors are teamed up with Guides who were themselves part of Transitions and are now undergraduate students at RCS.

Look out for a Fair Access Ambassador speaking about Fair Access opportunities at a school near you, particularly if you live in Ayrshire, Inverclyde or Glasgow. 

Between them, Thomas in Port Glasgow High, Angie in Robert Burns Academy and Erin in Castlemilk High school have spoken to a whopping 496 pupils and 50 teachers. The next stop on the Fair Access roadshow is at Auchenharvie Academy with Ambassadors Emma and Lucy. Watch out for them! 
 
Why is it worth being part of Fair Access? According to our Ambassadors… 

‘You can find your own creative expression through Fair Access. Give it a go – nothing to lose!’ 

‘It’s a top rated place and you could get these opportunities for free!’ 

‘RCS is a safe space and discrimination isn’t tolerated’ 

‘Everyone has been lovely and I’ve made so many friends’ 

Directing Skills for Pupils and Teachers

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Directing Skills Workshop 

For Pupils and their Teachers

Two young women sitting looking at scripts

Fair Access brought together Neil and Linda, both experts in their own fields, to work alongside pupils and teachers exploring directing skills. The session aimed to inspire pupils with the confidence to direct for Higher and Advanced Higher Drama, giving them practical skills to put into action, but also ensuring what they did fitted the SQA marking criteria for directing. It was a brilliant session involving pupils from eight different schools. Here are some comments: 

‘Thank you so much, it was an amazing opportunity and so informative. I now know that I want to be a director for sure!’

Pupil, Paisley Grammar



‘The session was very helpful in relation to SQA marking guidelines for Higher. It was very effective in boosting my own confidence and it was fabulous to see my pupils grow in confidence directing! I feel much more comfortable to present directing candidates.’

Teacher, Levenmouth Academy

 Get in touch 

If you’d like to find out about more opportunities for you and your pupils, contact the team at: fairaccesshello@rc.ac.uk 

Music Technology for the Faint Hearted

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Music Technology for the Faint Hearted 

CLPL for Music Teachers

A row of music teachers sitting at DAW stations

Alan Fraser from the BEd programme led a Career Long Professional Development Learning session on music technology, aimed at music teachers wanting to brush up their skills. Fourteen teachers joined us from Glasgow, North and South Lanarkshire, West Lothian, East Dunbartonshire, North Ayrshire, West Dunbartonshire and Dumfries and Galloway.

The session explored practical, hands-on shortcuts in the use of GarageBand, with one participant saying afterwards:

‘I can see how I would use this material in Broad General Education to ‘spark’ creativity in initial exposure to composition. It was a great course. Well presented, really interesting, supportive and inspiring – Thank you!!!’ 

Heather McMillan, Head of the Bachelor of Education (Music) course, joined us, as did Clare Hibberd, lecturer in Sound from our Production degree programme. Fair Access shouted out about our BEd Bridging programme! 

 Find Out More About Music Teaching Opportunities 

If you would like to study to become a music teacher or are a music teacher and interested in future CLPL opportunities, sign up for our mailing list to be kept up to date. You can also email and speak with the team on: fairaccesshello@rcs.ac.uk

Get Into: Film Visit Blazing Griffin

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Get Into: Film Visit Blazing Griffin 

Our ‘Get Into: Film’ course has two strands, Screenwriting and Sound (Post Production). Katy and Iona from the Sound course had the time of their lives when we visited Glasgow’s Blazing Griffin for an inside view. Thank you to Travis Reeves, RCS Sound Post Production tutor who runs our Sound strand, and a huge thank you to John Cobban Senior Dubbing Mixer at Blazing Griffin for an amazing, in-depth insight. 

Young person sitting in front of a mixing desk 
Katy and Iona sat next to John at the mixing desk in a huge dubbing suite, whilst he explained and demonstrated how he builds sound up for films and high-end television, across both drama and documentary. Working at the top of his professional game, John is a firm believer in supporting young people to feel they too can enter this world, which can seem so inaccessible.

Young person sitting in front of a mixing desk

Using (as yet) unreleased film material he’s currently working on, John showed how he’d chosen and manipulated the different elements of sound, which had a huge impact on the way we view the images. He answered loads of questions and provided an inspiring insight into what working in Post Production Sound can be like.

Back at RCS, Katy and Iona will now put some of these skills into action as they learn how to track their own scenes, under the guidance of Travis. 

Talking about ‘Get Into: Film’, and the trip to Blazing Griffin, Katy said:

‘You learn so differently on this course. When you go to school it’s always so structured. Teachers show you how to do stuff and you have a bunch of questions but here, cos it’s almost like one-on-one instruction, it’s a lot more hands-on and it feels more like a conversation than like a usual teaching experience. The best thing about Blazing Griffin, I have to say was seeing how stuff was made and also seeing stuff that isn’t released yet. I can’t say anything about it, right now (sworn to secrecy), but it was just very cool!’

Thank you Blazing Griffin! 

 Want to know more about our ‘Get Into’ programmes? 

Look out for more Get Into programmes that you can sign up for next Spring. If you have any questions or queries, email: fairaccesshello@rcs.ac.uk

 

Get Into: Performing and Production Arts Update

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Get Into: Performing and Production Arts Update 

Musical Theatre, Filmmaking, Production, Singing and Guitar

Two people standing in a darkended room experimenting with lighting

This term, Fair Access has been running a fantastic programme of ‘Get Into’ courses designed as pathways towards further training in higher education.

Forty-five young people from across Scotland attend weekly workshops to develop their skills and confidence in either Production Arts and Technology, Guitar, Musical Theatre or Filmmaking (which focuses on either Script Writing or Post-production Sound).

Young woman showing a prop

We are especially delighted to be working in partnership with Eden Court Theatre in Inverness to host a further ‘Get Into: Production’ course, which focuses on prop making and includes a work experience placement at RCS.

Courses are led by RCS tutors and freelance artists, many of whom are RCS alumni, now working professionally. In January we are excited to offer ‘Get Into: Singing’ as part of this programme. 

 Want to know more about our ‘Get Into’ programmes? 

Look out for more Get Into programmes that you can sign up for next Spring. If you have any questions or queries, email: fairaccesshello@rcs.ac.uk

Bachelor of Education (Music) Taster Morning

Posted on by Yvonne McLellan

 Bachelor of Education (Music) 

 Taster Morning 

Monday 11 December, 9:30am – 1pm

Are your pupils interested in studying Music Teaching at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland?

Sign up now for you and up to three of your pupils to attend our taster morning. Taking place here at RCS, it will focus on providing information for the Bachelor of Education (Music) Degree. 

This morning will be a great opportunity to:

  • Find out about our BEd Music programme from the people who teach it
  • Try your hand at an introduction to music studies session
  • See inside RCS and get a feel for what it could be like to study here
  • Get up close with the instruments and resources available at RCS
  • Meet the Fair Access Team and learn what support we can offer you and your pupils

Sign Up Deadline: 8 December, 12 noon

Fair Access is funded to support young people who face barriers in accessing the arts. You are welcome to book up to three of your pupils on this session who meet the following criteria:

Get in touch if you have any questions or need us to check a postcode for you.

 Contact Us 

If you have any questions or have any issues with filling out the form, please get in touch at: waci@rcs.ac.uk