Fèis Rois is one of ten arts organisations in Scotland to have been offered up to £30,000 each to develop innovative approaches to learning through Glow, the Scottish schools intranet. The funding is thanks to a dynamic partnership project between Learning and Teaching Scotland (LTS) and the Scottish Arts Council.

Glow is the world's first national intranet for education. It provides a platform for online collaboration and sharing and allows Scotland’s teachers and pupils to work and learn in ways that have not been possible before. Glow is breaking down barriers and making learning experiences and opportunities more widely accessible to users across Scotland.

The Co-Create Project has been set up to explore Glow’s potential to support innovative approaches to learning and teaching through the arts. It has the potential to enable artists, performers and Scotland’s schools to work and learn together in new ways, developing practice and demonstrating the key role the arts and creativity play in supporting Curriculum for Excellence.

In September 2009, the Co-Create Project invited Scottish Arts Council funded arts organisations to link up with new media companies and local authorities to develop inspiring new projects and resources for Glow, the Scottish schools intranet.

The successful partnerships will now go on to deliver pioneering and ambitious demonstration projects which will pilot new ways of learning and teaching. The projects selected will be implemented all over Scotland and represent a wide range of art forms.

Fèis Rois is already working in many Local Authorities across the country and, through this project, the organisation will link mainstream pupils from four primary schools in Aberdeenshire with disengaged learners in Highland, using the traditional arts of storytelling, music, song and dance with new media and technology.

Fèis Rois Manager, Fiona Dalgetty, said: “We are thrilled to have been awarded this grant. This is an exciting opportunity for Fèis Rois to expand and develop its work in the formal education sector on a national scale.”

Joan Parr, Head of Education, Scottish Arts Council said: “The quality and scope of projects chosen as part of this exciting new fund is testament to the passion and creativity of Scotland’s education and arts sectors.”

“Each of these projects, aside from encouraging new collaborations, recognises the important role the arts can play in learning; both in supporting and enhancing the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence and developing new and innovative approaches to learning and teaching through Glow. We are very excited to see how these projects and partnerships influence and shape the future of arts and education interaction.”

In addition to developing a national reputation for excellence in arts education, Fèis Rois continues to work extensively across Ross-Shire throughout the year. A new project based in Avoch was recently awarded the highest score of “excellent” in a Scottish Arts Council evaluation. Fèis Rois runs a musical after school club based at Avoch Primary School on a Tuesday afternoon and evening. Over 50 young people from P3 – S6 currently take part in classes in Gaelic song, tin whistle, fiddle, guitar and group music-making.

Brian Cope, a Specialist Advisor in Youth Music to the Scottish Arts Council, said: “The project is well conceived and provides excellent opportunities for children to learn traditional instruments in an environment that supports their different levels of experience and ability.”

“The tutors are all well established as performers on their respective instruments and it was nice to see how they were able to bring this experience into the sessions to inspire and motivate the children. They had made wonderful progress in the short time the project has been running. Some children who had started playing their instruments in September were already playing tunes on the fiddle using third finger. The beginner guitarists had made equally good progress having learned to play basic chords and melodies.”

Fèis Rois also runs after-school classes in Ullapool on Mondays, Dingwall on Tuesdays, and Evanton on Thursdays. Classes resume the week beginning Monday 18th January. If you would like to find out more about Fèis Rois’s weekly classes, please contact Education Officer, Ian Taylor on 01349 86 2600.