Elevate Youth Arts was an 18-month multidisciplinary creative arts initiative implemented by the Irish Refugee Council (IRC) for young people aged 16-24 seeking international protection. Based on feedback and experience running previous arts projects, the IRC youth work team, along with creative facilitators Chriszine Backhouse and Kelvin Akpaloo and three young leaders, devised this project and were awarded €58,000 from Creative Ireland’s Creative Youth Nurture Fund.
The goal of this project was to empower young people seeking international protection to develop their creativity, build confidence, develop new skills, and have fun. The project also aimed to model creative methods of youth participation and evaluation through the role of the youth leaders, the Youth Advisory Group, and the creative symposium.
Elevate Youth Arts demonstrates the importance of funding youth and community groups that have established relationships with young people seeking protection to implement creative projects, providing leadership and capacity-building pathways for young leaders from ethnic minority backgrounds, and ensuring long-term project funding to support meaningful youth participation.
This project was funded by the Creative Ireland Programme under the Creative Youth Nurture Fund Pilot which ran from 2023 – 2025. The pilot supported organisations and individuals that could reach groups of young people that are seldom heard to nurture their creative passions and ignite their creative potential.
