Kent County Council have today held their first ever Find Your Talent conference. Find Your Talent is part of a nation wide government plan to get all of today's youth more involved with their own and other people's cultures. However unlike the other projects running alongside Shepway, they have decided to be more unique and rename their project; we will reveal their results later.
During the opening conference they announced all the available culture workshops which consisted of Alexander D'Great's singing workshop, Peggy Riley's creative writing workshop , Demmi and Darwood's Poetry Class, Nicholette Goth's art Workshop,Marnie Summerfield-Smith'sword and movement Workshop, Jane Pitts Promotional Material workshop and Greg StobbsDesign and branding Class.
Many schools across Shepway took part in the entertaining and educating workshops, this includes High Schools and Primary. When we caught up with Douglas Noble; the executive in charge of the Find Your Talent Shepway; we asked him what FYT was all about.
"Find Your Talent Shepway is being run by The Creative Foundation in Folkestone. Today everyone who is coming to our first conference will have a chance to rename Find Your Talent. We are doing this so that Shepway has it's own name specific name."
We can reveal that the possibilities were, Spotlight, Dreams Alive and I can. Even though the 5 minutes of voting felt like a lifetime of anticipationthe KSS favourite pulled through to the top and we can announce that the winner was... SPOTLIGHT. So from now on Shepway's Find Your Talent is called spotlight and luckily through out the voting there was no hick ups with the high tech machinery.
Hard work and patients is the key to success.
After the voting had commenced the day went on quickly, so quick that it felt like a train ride from Folkestone to Ashford; which is not long at all. Every child and teen seemed totally focused and entwined with their workshop through out the whole day and some times it was hard to get a sentence from them as they concentrated on completing their chosen task, but we pulled through and snuck into get a few. When asked about the day there was one thing, which really stood out from everyone, they all said it was fun and inspirational. Then after the amazing and well thought outworkshops were over and we moved back into the hall for the last section of the conference we met Deborah Szebeko the leader of Co-Design.
Finale fit for a king
The final piece of today's Spotlight; Find Your Talent; conference and activity day was done by the guest speaker Deborah Szbeko where she talked to us about her journey and co-design; which is a really interesting subject. When we finally caught up with the lovely Deborah we managed to slip in a quick interview under her heavily booked schedule. We asked her what design was to her, her response was her life.
So it's obvious that this woman is dedicated to her work and will stick along with Spotlight till the end of its time. It seems that this government programme will benefit England and its children and lets be truthful this was a brilliant day with brilliant people behind the idea.
By James Yorke and Mark Rouse from KSS Radio
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