Local centre’s theatre-based education approach gains international recognition

AMMAN –– For Mohammad Mahjoub, receiving training at the National Centre for Culture and Arts (NCCA) was not only a chance to learn more about ways to utilise theatre to raise awareness on key issues, but also an opportunity to meet new friends. 

“It was an opportunity to make new friends from different countries who contributed ideas and means to solve problems in our country,” the Egyptian said in a statement made available to The Jordan Times. 

Mahjoub was one of several trainees from around the region who participated in a course held by the NCCA, which was recently designated as a regional centre of excellence on theatre-based education 

UNFPA created the project as a local centre for Y-PEER network members with the aim of institutionalising theatrical training at a more professional and sustainable level, NCCA Regional Director Lina Attel said. 

“We are… proud of this achievement,” she added. “Y-PEER is a voluntary network of young people that was created by UNFPA in the year 2000 for youths between the ages of 19 and 30.” 

“They receive training from UNFPA on several subjects, including life and communication skills, but the main objective is to deal with reproductive health issues, in addition to women’s rights and civil education through a peer education approach,” Attel told The Jordan Times in a recent interview.

NCCA organised the first regional training in 2013 for participants from 15 countries.

Following the positive evaluation of the training, NCCA has held four more regional courses.

The seven-day courses — led by teachers from NCCA — involved 40 working hours and targeted 25 participants.

“In these courses, we address social issues through the discipline of theatre with role playing, improvisation and storytelling techniques. We train participants on creative writing skills and we introduce singing as well,” Attel said, adding that UNFPA has prepared a “Theatre Based Techniques for Youth Peer Education Manual” in English.

“It includes a description of how you can devise a short theatre piece that has a message and how to write it and perform it using interactive theatre methodology. We were given the manual by UNFPA in Jordan and we have worked on its translation into Arabic, developing it to suit our culture.” 

The centre’s performance as a regional centre has also prompted
UNFPA to also involve it on a global level.

“UNFPA… approved our designation as a global centre of excellence for Y-PEER theatre-based education training. UNFPA believed our methodology would also be beneficial and useful to Europeans, especially Eastern Europeans, because problems facing youths globally are the same,” Attel said. 

The first international training programme will target Bulgarians.  

“This is all funded by UNFPA and we hope that in the future we will open the training for all, not only the Y-PEER network,” she added. 

Attel expected this achievement to put Jordan on the map of excellence in the arts.  

“To be placed as a global centre of excellence for theatre after having competed with many centres, not only in the region but also globally, is a big achievement for us and gives Jordan the recognition of being a… place of creativity.”