Boundary Breaking European Dance Connection Erasmus Project

Project Title

Boundary Breaking European Dance Connection

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Disabilities – special needs; Creativity and culture; Early School Leaving / combating failure in education

Project Summary

BBEDC as its name indicates, is a project aiming at breaking barriers through the practice of breakdancing.
It aims at answering the issue of compartmentalization that sometimes occurs in our communities and at giving pride and place to those who sometimes can feel left out. Five countries will be working with students and teachers of various abilities, internationally acclaimed dancers, school kids, some suffering from various forms of disabilities (mild, moderate or more serious, mental or physical), others in search of a new lease of life when school no longer appeals to them, all carrying a formidable artistic project together: the creation of a dance performance and the video documenting of the project.
Participants to the two shows will add up to 70 but the project, through the diversity of actions that will unfold and the multiplying events that are planned, will concern hundreds more. Besides, participants will be numerous in all partner structures. On top of mobilities, a lot of actions will be organized, starting with the attendance to cultural events and dissemination actions around these events. The main goal is to discover and acquire new experiences collectively, discover others, take them into account however different they may seem at first, discovering new countries and cultures, new school systems, discovering art and culture (the opera, the hip hop scene, musicals), new technologies and all in all a whole range of means of expression.
All partners will have specific tasks assigned and each will designate a coordinator and a person in charge of the accounts. The French partner will be piloting the whole project.
BBEDC does indeed focus on youngsters who for most of the participants in the project, feel different and even denigrated but the high quality of the partners and stakeholders involved in the project will be an incredible boost of confidence for them since they will be brought to create valuable and lasting pieces of art. Whether it be the video documentary part of the project or the two choreographies students will set up, the fact that they will be working with artists such as Peter Mika, Conor O’Kane, Lazylegz or Redouane Ait Chitt and the video company Art2Business in Warsaw will guarantee the creative, aesthetic but also demanding aspect of BBEDC.
BBEDC will awaken students to the fact that they have a voice, they can be heard if they feel the need to be heard. It will also show them the importance of mingling with other cultures to enrichen their experiences and widen their scopes of action. It will create a chain of people who will necessarily greatly benefit from this new network and hopefully arouse artistic vocations. The artistic project should last beyond the 3-year period, since schools, rich of all the newly acquired skills, will be able to carry on with the breakdancing activities and video classes. The boundaries that will disappear during the project will remain so, schools will make sure that collaborative work persists beyond the BBEDC project, students will continue working on common creations, disregarding the fact that disability may be a liability. Teachers will have learned how to work collectively, sharing projects with colleagues teaching different subjects and different class profiles. A school community must be inclusive of everyone and achievement should be measured by new standards taking into consideration the input any given individual can bring to a project. The coaching dance teachers will have received from Lazylegz will also enable them, to open their classes and schools to pupils with disabilities, they will know how to include them in their programs and this will create a whole new dynamic in our communities. As for the more specialised participants, the dancers in the Spanish and Dutch companies, they will come out enrichened by this new human and artistic venture and will have grown confident they can themselves be in charge of projects including a great diversity of participants. Furthermore, the emphasis put on the discovering of European cultures by BBEDC and the great progress made as far as linguistic skills are concerned, will make all participants keen European travellers and standard bearers.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 186280 Eur

Project Coordinator

Collège le Petit Versailles & Country: FR

Project Partners

• Stichting Breaksquad
• The Lawnmowers Independent Theatre Company
• ROOTS Dance Studio
• COBOSMIKA COMPANY SL
• LXIX Liceum Ogolnoksztalcace im. Bohaterow Powstania Warszawskiego 1944