Celebrating 25 years of the National Lottery: Peace Partners supports ‘Get Creative with Peace’

Peace Partners​ is the recipient of a ​National Lottery 2019 Community Fund Award​. One of the many​ ​projects it has been able to help support through the award is the ​Get Creative with Peace​ initiative organised in Brixton, south London by Celebrate Life Events​ ​(CLE). CLE host regular cross-community and musical celebration events in London which have a focus on creativity and peace.  CLE held its initial Get Creative with Peace workshop in April 2019 and you can read about the event on CLE’s website  celebrate-life.co.uk/get-creative-with-peace​.

Following its success a further five of these interactive workshops were hosted during the summer, made possible in part by significant funding from Peace Partners’ Lottery Award.
​The workshop was developed to be used with teenagers, especially in London schools and youth centres, as well as with other community groups and was piloted as a means of introducing people to the internationally acclaimed, Prem Rawat Foundation Peace Education Programme. 

Each of the five interactive workshops included video clips of peace ambassador Prem Rawat’s simple message, alongside activities, reflection and creative expressions through poetry and art. The guest facilitators were selected especially for the specific audience of each workshop. Overall 137 people attended, and a number of attendees came to several of the workshops.  
That the workshops were a real success can be gauged by some of the comments of the participants themselves:  ‘Absolutely amazing.’ ‘Absolutely brilliant, I loved it.’ 
‘Every human being deserves at least one lesson that shows them they are creative.’ ‘The videos really made me reflect.’ It was ​completely different to anything I’ve been to before.’  ‘It was really freeing, I’m leaving really uplifted … so thank you.’

Roni, one of the CLE organisers said, “Participants and facilitators seemed to really enjoy the message in the video clips and being able to express themselves in a creative way, as did the volunteers!” 
As one of its partners CLE shares with Peace Partners a commitment to help address the problem of youth violence in cities across the UK.  Peace Partners’ Director Juli Hammersley says of the collaboration, “Peace Partners is delighted to support this initiative, which is awakening a real and vibrant hope in the lives of young Londoners and the wider communities of which they are a part.” 
Peace Partners is proud to be a part of the National Lottery 25th anniversary celebrations, and to be able to support a project like​ ​Get Creative with Peace which is making a difference in the lives of young, as well as not so young, Londoners. 

Links for more information: 
Peace Partners 
CLE Get Creative with Peace Workshop 
CLE Five Interactive Workshops responses 
CLE and ‘Seeds of Peace’ at Lambeth College, Clapham 
Peace Partners Waves of Change Forum, Croydon Festival of Peace
The Prem Rawat Foundation’s Peace Education Programme