The Children's Festival of Arts that is held in May of every year has become a staple of the school year for primary schools countrywide. And while the children get to harness, cultivate and display their performing arts talents, that opportunity is largely reserved for primary schoolers. So what about the high school children? Don't they also aspire to the stage? Well they do, and now the Institute of Creative Arts will give them the opportunity to strut their stuff in the secondary schools festival of the arts. The resurrection of the event re-connects an important link in the creative chain, and Leroy Green Program Director at the Institute of Creative Arts explains why they just had to do it.
Leroy Green, Programme Director - ICA
"In the 1970s the secondary school's festival of arts was a big thing here in Belize and then for various reasons it became dormant. Last year the high school teachers requested that we have their own festival but we were not then ready to start their festival. This year however NICH has decided, through the offices of ICA, that we are going to revive this festival. Last year, as you know, we were only having the primary school's festival of arts. However here in the Belize District ten primary schools participated in that festival. So we believe with their own festival, we'll get even more participation countrywide. Because of the nature and the interest of the people between the ages of 13 to 19, you find that the skits and so on that they put on stage are more adult and not really suitable for a children's festival so by separating it, they'll have a chance to display the things that interest them. Also, even though we are having drama, dance, music, and visual arts, we've had to extend these categories in the sense that teenagers are interested in things like rap, deejay, dancehall music---so we've had to compose additional adjudication sheets to accommodate that sort of things."
The secondary schools' national festival of arts will run from March 20th to the 24th.
