What’s Your Story

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What’s Your Story (WYS) is a great example of young peoples creative talents and the sort of projects Creative Express can deliver.

Funded and supported through Scotland’s Year of Stories 2022, WYS offered groupwork and one-to-one opportunities to explore themes of: Identity, Community and Hope.

These themes, identified by young people consulted during the summer, led to Creative Express running weekly WYS group sessions that included inputs from Storyteller Claire McNicol and Writer Ken Cockburn.

The project included a fantastic performance event held at Leith Community Centre, attended by an audience of friends, family, local projects, local young people and supportive others.

This allowed some of the WYS participants to share their creative work and that of other young people involved in the project.

Feedback from the event was also really encouraging…

…”A wonderful event, which I thoroughly enjoyed. It was evident the amount of preparation that went in to it an the young people’s passion was captivating. I really enjoyed contributing to the themes on the boards ‘identity, hope and community’ and then reading what other’s had written. All-in-all, a great evening filled with talent, community spirit that encapsulated collective emotions in the young people’s writing.”…

…you can read what else people had to say here: Audience Feedback and the feedback from the young people who were involved in the project has been fantastic:

“I loved it all, I feel like we all worked so hard and well together, and then the final event was this fantastic climax to the whole project.”
“Through this project I have learned that I can push myself further than I thought, and realised I have skills I never knew I had.”
“The Junction staff helped to make the event a safe space to express ourselves in, it was good how there were things the audience were able to do on the night to share some their thoughts and ideas on our themes too.”
“When I first heard that we would be using creative prompts in all the sessions – I didn’t think that would work for me, but what I discovered was the opposite is true – they really work for me and I get a lot of ideas and motivation from hearing what everyone else comes up with when we do them. I would definitely do another project like this in the future.”
“Having shared my stories in the group and in front of an audience, I know feel more confident and able to share my stories in a therapeutic setting, when getting support. More able to use creative writing to support my mental health.”
“Getting out of my comfort zone, especially in front of the external tutors, challenged me to pull myself out of my little bubble. And doing the show has made me feel like I could get up in front of an audience again – and enjoy it.”