“drama without borders : discovering the contemporary theater” Erasmus Project

Project Title

“drama without borders : discovering the contemporary theater”

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 : School Exchange Partnerships

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Early School Leaving / combating failure in education; Creativity and culture; Gender equality / equal opportunities

Project Summary

The project « Drama without borders : discovering contemporary theater » is aimed at setting up an artistic production gathering 2 groups of 22 high school students ( age group: 15 -18 years old) used to practicing drama activities on a regular basis . Both groups come from rural areas in France (Chinon) and Lithuania (Sakiai).
This one-week school exchange will give the two groups the opportunity to immerse themselves in their partner country’s culture, customs and skills. They will thus be able to take part in drama workshops, share their knowledge and experiences, attend acting and performance classes as well as various plays and shows (classical theatre/ modern theatre/opera/ dance/ circus…), discuss their tastes, traditions , and artistic choices, and eventually follow the evolution of their counterparts‘ artistic work .Each group of students will indeed work all along the year on a specific project and on an author who embodies the cultural specificity of the partner country. By regularly communicating via social networks and a dedicated blog and sharing other special moments, both French and Lithuanian students will discover and make the most of the specificities of each country, this interchange of cultural experiences will enrich their experience of “otherness” which is so much at the core of creation and art.
Thus, while French students will discover contemporary authors from Eastern countries (Russia, Poland, and Lithuania of course), Lithuanian students will explore western theatre and its main authors.
December 2020 and April 2021 will mark 2 highlights of the project: on the occasion of the students’ trip to the partner country, the 2 groups will take up the challenge of presenting to the public a joint show, highlighting the partnership and its effects.
The project will be supervised by an education team involved in teaching practical and theoretical drama and by professional artists: Mrs Migle Bereikaite, an actress, Laura Saunoriené and Marijanas Staniulènas, both choreographers. It will also involve – together with the education team and the school administrators – the students’ families, the local people, the local elected officials and cultural services as well as the regional cultural and artistic structures (theatre and opera houses, music anddrama academies and schools) which will all fully take part in the project and intervene at each level.
Original and ambitious, our project is however realistic. It is nourished by our common experience and our love of theatre, and aims at specific, concrete and measurable objectives: beyond the strictly artistic objectives, it contributes to the formation of judgment and taste, as well as the reduction of territorial and socio-cultural inequalities of which many pupils are victims, inequalities which, as we know, often go hand in hand with economic and school difficulties, and are accompanied by an almost total lack of mobility. It is also known that such cultural openness is not without impact on the success path of each student, and produces positive effects in more theoretical disciplines. In this sense, such a project is an effective way to fight against school failure or dropout, and helps to strengthen the student’s motivation, and to develop the fundamental values of solidarity, respect and tolerance.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 32607 Eur

Project Coordinator

LYCEE RABELAIS & Country: FR

Project Partners

• Sakiu “Ziburio” gimnazija