CONFERENCE 2025
WEDNESDAY 2 JULY, 2025
DERBY THEATRE


CONFERENCE 2025
WEDNESDAY 2 JULY, 2025
Bold and brilliant performances. Shows that represent our community. A platform for groundbreaking artists. A pathway for learners of all ages. A guaranteed great night out. We’re a theatre like no other. We’re known for artistic excellence. We’re committed to education. And we believe that theatre can change your life.
ONE-DAY SCHEDULE
WEDNESDAY 2 JULY, 2025
DERBY THEATRE
9.30AM-10AM
PUBLIC REGISTRATION / PROVIDER SET-UP TIME
10AM-10.50AM
OFFICIAL WELCOME & KEYNOTE – MAIN HOUSE
• Presenters: Niki & Sam (Plus One Ambassadors)
• Youth Theatre Film
• Keynote: Richard Dawson – Reflections on Derby Theatre’s Plus One Programme
10.50AM-11.50AM
BREAKOUT SESSION 1
Workshop leaders will then head to their workshops space. Derby Theatre staff will gather participants and escort them to your space.
• BLUE CABIN W1: CREATIVE AID – COMMUNITY HUB
• BLUE CABIN W2: THIS IS THE PLACE – REHEARSAL ROOM
• CARE TO DANCE – STUDIO
• TVF (THE VERBATIM FORMULA) – STAGE
• DERBY VIRTUAL SCHOOL – UPPER FOYER
11.50AM–12PM
BREAK - NEAR CAFÉ/BAR
Derby Theatre staff will gather participants and escort them to our Upper Foyer for refreshments.
12PM-12:50PM
BREAKOUT SESSION 2
Derby Theatre staff will gather participants and escort them to your space.
• BLUE CABIN W1: CREATIVE AID – COMMUNITY HUB
• BLUE CABIN W2: THIS IS THE PLACE – REHEARSAL ROOM
• CARE TO DANCE – STUDIO
• TVF (THE VERBATIM FORMULA) – STAGE
• DERBY VIRTUAL SCHOOL – UPPER FOYER
12.50PM-2PM LUNCH
Derby Theatre staff will gather participants and workshops teams and escort them to the upper foyer.
Location: Upper Foyer / Community Hub.
2PM-3PM CARE LEAVER PRESENTATIONS - MAIN HOUSE
2PM-2.15PM: Richard Crellin and Sam Porter
2.15PM-2.40PM: Ty’rone Haughton (Literati Arts)
2.40PM-3.05PM: Lucy James
3PM-3.15PM
BREAK - CAFÉ
3.15PM-4PM
AUDIENCE WITH FATIMA WHITBREAD - MAIN HOUSE
• Includes lecture and PowerPoint presentation
4PM-4.30PM
CLOSING SESSION – MAIN HOUSE
• Youth Reflections and Call to Action.
• Care to Dance – Final performance.
01332 593939 | derbytheatre.co.uk
Text: 07717 346 964
Facilitators: Jane Gray (Project Manager), Catherine, Gail
Creative Aid is a co-creation project involving care-experienced participants at Deerbolt Prison, supporting them to be recognised as artists and creative contributors.
In this session, we will:
• Introduce the Creative Aid project.
• Explore the experiences of care leavers within the criminal justice system.
• Share the project’s impact to date.
• Offer space for open questions and discussion.
Facilitators: Lucy Ridely (Director)
This is The Place is an early years music-making project designed to support the development of attachment and relationships.
In this session, we will:
• Introduce the project and its approach.
• Discuss why early years music-making supports attachment.
• Share insights into the impact of the project.
• Provide time for questions and open discussion.
Care to Dance is a social enterprise led by social workers and dancers, supporting care-experienced young people through dance. We create safe, creative spaces where young people can express themselves, build confidence, and connect with others who understand their experiences. In this workshop, we will:
• Explore the principles of trauma-informed practice.
• Reflect on how practitioners can create safe, supportive environments.
• Share strategies to help care-experienced young people feel secure, empowered, and able to thrive. Join us to discover how movement and understanding can come together to create transformative impact.
The Verbatim Formula (TVF) invites you to an interactive workshop exploring the transformative power of creativity in the lives of careexperienced young people. Through our arts-based research, we centre the voices and experiences of young people, co-creating methodologies that foster imagination, agency, and change.
In this session, we will:
• Share creative methods developed by our care-experienced co-researchers.
• Explore how the arts can positively impact identity, expression, and wellbeing.
• Invite you to create and share your own testimony using our unique headphone theatre technique.
Care to Dance iDerby Virtual School, part of Derby City Council, supports the education of children in care and those previously in care. Working with schools, carers, social workers, and cultural partners, we aim to help every young person achieve their full potential.
In this session, we will:
• Share our creative education offer.
• Highlight the value of partnership working.
• Show how we celebrate and accredit achievements.
• Showcase inspiring work by our young people.
BREAKOUT SESSIONS ARE HOSTED ON THE MORNING AND THE AFTERNOON OF THE CONFERENCE.
Fatima Whitbread, MBE is a world javelin champion, world record holder and twice Olympic medallist. She was honoured with the Helen Rollason Award at the BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2023. The Helen Rollason Award recognises outstanding achievement in the face of adversity.
After Fatima’s inspirational career as an athlete, the former BBC Sports Personality of the Year winner headed the Chafford Hundred elite runners club whose members included Linford Christie and Dame Kelly Holmes. Fatima has served as a school governor, is a qualified javelin coach, and spent many hours reporting at the Olympics. As well as being the last woman standing on I’m a Celebrity Get me Out of Here, she cooked her way to total victory on the all-sport-champion’s Come Dine with Me. In addition, she took part in a celebrity version of the Channel 4 show, Total Wipeout. Fatima delved into her family history filming for Channel 5’s My Secret Past-. Fatima had a fitness strand on This Morning and has also taken part on A Question of Sport, The Wright Stuff, Celebrity Blockbusters, Through the Keyhole with Keith Lemon and co-fronted the BBC Learning Campaign – Olympic Give an Hour.
Fatima was a contestant on the highly rated ITV series Eternal Glory’- and took part in Pilgrimage: The Road to Istanbul on BBC 2. She joined six other celebrities of differing faiths and beliefs to tackle a modern-day, 2,200-km pilgrimage across Eastern Europe to the historic city of Istanbul. In 2022 Fatima appeared in Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins. She broke three of her ribs while jumping out of a helicopter for a challenge but hid her suffering so she wouldn’t be pulled from the show. She most recently took part in ITV’s I’m a Celebrity South Africa where she came in third place. This was a show where some of the favourite contestants across the series came together to compete against each other.
Fatima’s best-selling autobiography Fatima: The Autobiography of Fatima Whitbread was published in 1989. Fatima’s second book, Survivor was published in July 2012 and is a truly inspirational story. Her third book ‘My Bright Shining Star’ was published in October 2024. My Bright Shining Star follows the story of a girl who finds herself living in a shared home away from her mother, yet through the love and support provided by confidant Aunty Rae she unlocks respect, self-worth and confidence.
Fatima is an engaging speaker who talks about her rise to success as an Olympic medallist and the trials and tribulations as she reached her goal. In addition, she talks animatedly about her TV career from I’m a Celebrity to her more recent documentaries.
Fatima has recently launched a campaign called ‘Fatima’s UK Campaign’, aimed at helping children in care and care leavers. The hope is for children to fulfil their positive potential in an environment which fosters self-worth and confidence by means of providing the necessary support & resources to give each youngster the skills and to become productive members of society. As the founder of the Charity, Fatima wants to rejuvenate the children’s care system and pursue excellence across the four nations in working with the care system to create a nationalistic framework with the summit taken place in April 2025. The inaugural Summit was organised to bring together cross-party politicians, decision makers, and representatives from all agencies and charities involved in the care system.
TO DONATE:
REGISTERED CHARITY NO: 1207064
SORT CODE: 40-42-27
ACCOUNT NUMBER: 22424304
Agent Contact Details
Kate Heather | kate@rhtalent.com | 07974 114870
In 2024, Richard spent five months embedded within Derby Theatre’s Plus One Programme, observing its delivery and impact. His resulting report offers a powerful reflection on the programme’s reach, celebrates key successes and partnerships, and provides an honest evaluation of what it takes to create meaningful arts opportunities for care-experienced young people.
Literati Arts uses the power of poetry to bring people together and amplify voices that are often unheard. We believe poetry creates space for honest self-expression and helps process complex emotions. Our mission is to use poetry and performance as tools for healing, empowerment, and connection—especially for those with care experience.
Lucy James is a song writing practitioner, theatre composer, researcher, and tutor at the Institute of Contemporary Music Performance. Creatively raised by Plus One Derby—a programme that fundamentally reshaped her sense of possibility—Lucy never imagined she would go on to study a BA or an MA before joining the Plus One. She has spent the past eight years working as a community songwriter within the careexperienced community, using song writing as a tool for narrative enquiry, identity formation, and personal transformation. Her Masters project in Song writing explored innovative methodologies for examining her own experience of entering care at 16, culminating in an autoethnographic musical theatre album. This work contributed to her being awarded a commendation for NEON Student of the Year 2024 at the Palace of Westminster.
The Plus One Project at Derby Theatre aims to increase cultural engagement and access to the arts for young people in Derby and the surrounding areas.
a. We will co-produce the programme with young participants to ensure they are fully involved in the design and delivery of the work that we do.
b. We will take a non-directive approach, so that participants can define their own personal pathways that are right for them.
c. We will engage with young people through play, purpose, interest and passion.
d. We will foster a supportive learning environment that encourages personal growth and independence.
Plus one is a collaborative project facilitated by Derby theatre with support from:
QUAD, Déda, Baby People, Derby City Virtual School (DCVS), Derby’s Cultural Education Partnership, Derby City Council, Job Centre.
We want this to encapsulates the project’s essence, success, and areas for improvement. The project has stories that bring joy, break your heart, stories to challenge and stories that are yet to end.
This report enables you to get a glimpse into a project that has the privilege of journeying and supporting young people during challenging times.
It will also be a vital tool that encapsulates the project’s essence, success, and areas for improvement. It will play a critical role in ensuring accountability, securing funding, informing strategic planning, and enhancing communication and advocacy efforts.
Due to the collaborative nature of the project we have been able to get both quantitative and qualitative data from the different agencies, this has been integral in being able to bring the plus one story to life.
The Youth theatre programme enables young people who are known to the care system to develop skills and have opportunities to perform. Ran by drama therapists, the sessions can also be about the young people learning about themselves and each other in a safe space.
This young person has been attending the Monday night youth theatre group for the past couple of years. Their home life has been unpredictable and has had lots of changes and so being able to give him space to do something he enjoys has been really important to him. When he first started college he struggled to make connections with his peers. In his own words he had confidence but struggled to make friends. What Plus one has helped him do is find ways of working with others and give him that extra self belief to build strong relationships both inside the group and in his wider world.
One of his other struggles was stage fright, although he loved acting he had always found stepping onto the stage daunting. Plus one has been able to help with that and give him the experiences to be able to handle his emotions and do something he loves.
Alfie loves story telling and would love the opportunity to develop his creative writing.
Here are what some of the other young people have said about these sessions:
“ I like that we are able to be ourselves here. ”
“ It's really enjoyable, especially with people that are looking for that type of stuff. ”
“ It has given me opportunities that I never thought I would have.”
“ I absolutely love performing.”
“ I have met some really cool people. ”
“ It’s helped me to learn to work with others and listen to other people’s ideas.”
“ The most memorable thing I have been involved in has been the end of a performance, when you get the support of the audience. Because there’s always that one guy that goes up and says, well done. So I think that, because then you realise everything you’ve done isn’t for nothing, it actually means something to other people. I think that was probably the most meaningful bit. The applause and the support and the happiness you bring to others. Well, that’s my most meaningful bit of all.”
Creative Mentoring is a strand which works with children referred through DCVS. We have two programmes: Creative Mentoring 8 – 16 and Post 16 Creative mentoring. Each ask the young person referred to select from our pool of trained mentors. Our Mentors are all Professional Creatives from across the city, specialising in a range of creative artforms. All sessions focus on not only the artistic development of participants in addition to focussing on developing aspiration, initiative, confidence and communication. Our Post 16 stand combines our approach with focusing on transitions. This could include supporting young people with their educational choices, employment or gaining further work experience.
“
My creative mentor is someone that I can come to and I know I can trust them, I can speak to them and I get good advice. They would always say to do the right thing and put me in the right direction.
I have been able to get help with my English school work because everybody needs a person there to help them and give them advice when you feel like have nobody.
If someone asked me if they should have a creative mentor I would say definitely go for it because it has helped me to know that I have a person I can go to and I can trust them and you now have a relationship with that person that you know that it’s someone who’s gonna tell you the truth but you trust them and if they say something hard you know it’s true and they know that you know have good intentions. ”
“ I am an artist who works with Plus One delivering creative and animation projects, one-to-one and with groups.
These sessions give the young people a chance to learn and develop new skills, to explore ideas and their creativity.
Throughout the sessions, there is definite increase in confidence; excitement and pride in their work, and lots of fun.
Plus One provides a supportive and safe environment for the young people to grow ”
HELEN JACKSON
PLUS ONE - ARTIST FACILITATOR AND CREATIVE MENTOR
11 Current mentorships, 3 about to start, and 4 pre-matched mentorships.
Post16 Mentoring: 4 In current mentorship, two young people have both gotten into college since starting the programme which their mentors have helped them with applications and pushing them forward. Another got a job (Unfortunately, has since had to leave due to hours) but is still actively applying. 4 pre-matched mentorships.
41 Creative Mentoring Sessions
12 Museum of Making Sessions
11 Post 16 Mentoring Sessions
The Virtual School Fest (VSF) is an annual event where children and young people in care can come along, have some fun, eat some great food and try new creative skills that they may want to develop in the future.
The VSF is a highlight of the DCVS calendar. It is an impactful and meaningful way to bring the Looked After Children together with their community to celebrate and reward the achievements they have made throughout the year. The event attracts around 100 young people of both primary and secondary ages with their parents and carers.
It is a key social event for lots of youngsters, and it is a chance to see children try new creative activities and, in many cases, they get to pursue these activities further with them after the event. It is a significant part in DCVS’s work with young people and it is wonderful to be able to celebrate them in this way.
Foster carers comments from the event:
“ The atmosphere of the event was absolute joy and excitement ”
“ From a foster carers view, we get to see children and young people we have met in the past and moved on too. Great to see them and chat about what they are doing. ”
“ Young person left from (the event) making a chair saying “I think I’d like to do that as a job!” How inspiring is that? ”
“ My kids had a great time as did we! The food, crafts, the games, music, workshops, everything was outstanding! ”
Plus One though led by Derby Theatre is supported by our Cultural Education Partners. We draw on these relationships to produce cross disciplinary projects and workshops. This partnership has led to the curation of the ‘One Day’ Film, and a weekly Digital Animation workshop. These also rely heavily on collaboration from the Virtual School.
Derby Virtual School and Plus One collaborated on the below creative projects over 23-24:
• Digital animation – 6 children, 6 week course afterschool with animation première at QUAD cinema for carers and children.
• Puppet making – 8 children 8 week course and video made, showcased at VS Fest.
• One Day Film – 15 children, 5 sessions during school days and holidays, with première at QUAD and showcased at a National conference in Manchester about experiences of being in care.
• Arts Award – accreditation for our children to celebrate their Arts participation.
• In 2023/4 there have been 18 different creative Artists across the different projects.
There was also a collaboration on a presentation at our summer VS Regional conference delivering a workshop about our above creative offer and benefits to our children and community.
“ It has helped build a community of creatives across the city which helps me feel I belong.”
“ I feel truly inspired when I work alongside such talented people.”
“ It’s so much fun when you work with other talented Artists.”
Our Plus One Ambassadors consist of older programme graduates. We employ our Ambassadors to work events, provide involvement in research projects or feed their applications into paid work experience or roles across the cultural education partnership.
Culture Cares brings the cultural and care sectors together for insightful and lively conversations, presentations and workshops. Together we will explore how arts and culture are making a positive impact and creating pathways in the lives of care-experienced young people. The conference has been developed in partnership with partners of the Esmée Fairbairn Young People Leaving Care funding stream. This is a radical investment programme with the aim of challenging and changing injustice and structural inequality for care leavers.
Plus One works in partnership Derby-based Creative Art Therapists Catharsis. We have a dedicated budget line for providing paid sessions.
We programme workshops in the city’s local authority Residential Homes. This focus on communal workshops, from cooking, gardening and music making.
“ The partnership between Derby Theatre and the Plus One mentoring scheme and the Councils Early Help and Children’s Social Care Service offers transformative benefits for children, leveraging the arts to foster personal and academic growth. The benefits I’ve seen for Derby’s children participating in this scheme are multifaceted. Exposure to the arts stimulates imaginative thinking and problem-solving skills, which can translate into better academic performance and a more positive attitude towards learning. Plus One provides a safe space for self-expression, helping children articulate their thoughts and emotions more effectively and promotes social inclusion. Children from diverse backgrounds come together, fostering empathy and understanding among peers. The collaborative nature of Plus One work teaches valuable teamwork and leadership skills, preparing children for future challenges and offers children a sense of achievement and pride. These experiences also open up potential career pathways in the arts, broadening their horizons.
In summary, Derby Theatre and Plus One mentoring partnership enriches children’s lives by combining creative arts with mentorship, promoting confidence and social skills in a nurturing and inspiring setting. ”
SUANNE LIM DIRECTOR OF EARLY HELP AND CHILDREN’S SOCIAL CARE
“ Plus One have worked closely with the fostering service to offer activities for foster carers and children together at our activity days. They have provided a range of activities, including DJ workshops, face painting/glitter tattoos, pottery, lino printing and biscuit decorating. Nothing is too much trouble for them and they are also keen contributors in planning the events.
Our foster carers and children in care who live with them, have benefited massively from the mentoring opportunities and have grown in confidence from the opportunities provided for them. They have also given us opportunities to attend the theatre by providing free tickets to shows and cinema viewings.
I cannot praise Tom and his team highly enough, they are brilliant! ”
“ Derby City Leaving care service has been working in partnership with Derby Theatre Plus 1 project for several years. Plus One have been committed in supporting our Care Leavers and this has included supporting our Celebration events.
This involved supporting Individual care leavers to perform on stage at the event. This clearly has instilled these young people with greater self-belief and confidence and has made a significant different to their outlook on life and future aspirations. Performing dance routines and also gaining the confidence to fulfil a dream to be a DJ. Mentoring that made a difference and above all was fully inclusive and bespoke to the care experienced.
Plus One have also supported and encouraged our care leavers to attend a Christmas pantomime and have also provided Creative mentors to our Young people. Plus One have put on buffets for care experienced and their children ensuring an exciting day out for all. Helping socially isolated young parents build friendships. ”
ANTHONY MAINS LEAVING CARE TEAM
For those young people that have been part of the Plus One project for a few years and have engaged in different areas of the work the impact has been life changing:
“ The journey I have had since first talking part in Plus One to now working for them is amazing, I never thought I could be a producer, writer, director and mentor. ”
“ Being in foster care when I was 12 to performing with Goldie and Nocturnal Joe makes you guys the sweetest. ”
“ He’s (creative mentor) helped me guide me in terms of my lyric writing, because I used to struggle with a lot of writer’s block. Now, I’ve gone past that and we’ve made five songs in three months and that to me is a massive achievement. ”
“ This project has had a massive effect on my self-esteem in a positive way and my confidence. You know, now I can speak with confidence. I can go to places with confidence and I can turn up with confidence and as a young mentee that is everything you want everything you need because in this world is hard. So when you have the confidence, it boosts your self-esteem because it blocks out all the negative noises around you and amplifies the positives. ”
“ Through the project I have made lots of friends and not just friends for a short-term, but long-time friends and that’s been amazing for me. And as I’ve got older, I’ve made some connections throughout the music industry. You know, I’ve been connected to Places like baby people where there’s other young-minded people like myself, that Like music. ” “ Sometimes with creative mentor and talking about things that you don’t want to speak about and get stepping out of your comfort zone is tough. I’m just talking about things that you wouldn’t usually talk about and doing things that you won’t usually do but helps you. ”
“ I was meant to go to my creative mentor and I was struggling with moving house because over the past year after leaving my foster placement, I’ve had to move house about six times and it can have a really big impact on your mental health, what some people may not understand is you might not have the energy to actually, get up after moving, and being upset, or struggling and being able to get up and go and sometimes even being able to message and cancel is ok and so people just don’t understand that sometimes, so maybe that’s something that should be shared and people should know. ”
As you look through the data and the stories you get a glimpse of the impact that Plus One has had over the past couple of years. What you don’t see and what I have experienced over the past few months of spending time within the project is how difficult it is to get the balance right for the creatives that have been involved.
Working with children and young people that are going through or have gone through some of the most traumatic experiences you can imagine is challenging in itself and it could be easy to think that engaging them through the arts is just a way to help them find a safe space. I have observed that it is much more than that and involves the team being much more than a facilitator. This is where the challenge in a project like Plus One really lies.
Each of the young people will arrive at the session in a different place and for some of them it is the only place where they can be themselves, for others they are struggling to cope with life at that moment and so they arrive at a session not always ready or equipped to engage. The dilemma for each of the creatives at that point is how do you facilitate a session when you are unaware of what is happening in a particular young person’s life and so are unable to engage in the session.
There have also been other sessions where a young person in care has turned up and another young person in the same session is a biological sibling placed with a different foster family and the team weren’t aware of this relationship.
Derby City Virtual School say “Yes, in terms of challenges its things that are unexpected and unpredictable, and we never know what sort of day the children have had or what has been happening for them so when the arrive at the creative sessions, we try to keep it as their happy place with all fun things with like minded peers who all share similar experiences with their circumstances, with no judgment from us or them.”
The project that virtual schools run on a Thursday after school starts with them all eating a hot meal together, young people and their foster carers. This is a great opportunity for the team to just observe and see where the young people are at before they start the creative session. It also creates a sense of belonging for all involved, a place of safety and security.
What I have seen as the young people have engaged and interacted with each other is a sense of understanding and empathy of each other’s situation despite of their age.
During the Monday Youth theatre group the challenge for the team is getting the balance right between being creative therapists and facilitators. Being able to do both is a struggle so being able to have a strong enough team that can mix and match in terms of trained therapeutic support and facilitating the session is really important.
There are opportunities and challenges around engagement, motivation and behaviour during each of the sessions which are not always easily planned for but are as important if not more so than the actual programme for the young people.
What has shone throughout this report and is important to highlight is the collaboration and partnership that goes on throughout the plus one project. This has created a space for community on so many levels from the young people themselves, to the foster carers to the artists. All of these groups have expressed their heartfelt thanks for creating spaces for them to connect with others and build relationships. In a world where isolation is still a major factor for a lot of people Plus One is creating real life changing opportunities.
Another way the partnership is moving forward is by relating all their creative projects to the Arts Award. This enables the young people to feel a sense of achievement through the different activities and for some of them that struggle in a mainstream educational systems due to ACES then it can give them a sense of self-worth and pride in what they do.
Facilitating creative sessions with young people in care is both challenging and rewarding. It requires a deep understanding of trauma, attachment, and the specific needs of individuals. Therapists must be flexible, patient, and creative, using the arts as a powerful tool to help these young people process their experiences, build resilience, and find their voice. Plus one does that in so many creative ways and should be seen as a benchmark in terms of quality of provision.
The challenge and future focus is to have sustainability as although this project is around creative projects the most important part of Plus One is the relationships. Working with young people who are in an environment where their support network and key relationships can change in an instant, Plus One can be the stability the young people need in their often chaotic lives. Therefore, any future aims and objectives must have consistent relationships and voices at the centre of it.
For anyone looking to develop future work:
• Value relationships. An effective model of working has the relationship with the young person as the anchor and there will be times when the relationship needs to be put ahead of your planning.
• It will be tough. You need to realise young people within the care setting have experienced trauma that can show itself in any way at anytime. Make sure facilitators are aware and equipped to work with them.
• Create community and build belonging. Young people are crying out to find a safe space where they can be creative and learn how to handle their emotions.
• Have fun, if you are having fun, they will have fun. Some of the young people have a lot going on so having a space where they can smile can be hugely important.
I would just like to thank the following people for their input and help in building this report.
Craig,
Delivered by Derby Theatre and partners across the city, the Plus One programme offers tickets to performances, workshops and social events for care-experienced young people, helping them to develop confidence, learn new skills and build relationships in a safe and creative environment.