In the wake of the recent unrest in London and around the UK, Zoe Jackson, founder and director of Living the Dream, said: "Our young people are in trouble for all sorts of reasons that we don't always understand. Young people of today are tomorrow's leaders.  They bring energy, new perspectives and a new voice to our society but sadly, the media presents a negative image of young people".

She unveiled plans for a youth-led campaign, “I Have a Dream” to promote the positive contribution that young people can make through the performing and visual arts.

We believe that despite their damaged image and the pressures they experience, young people continue to look for avenues to express themselves in a safe environment, work hard, be creative, have fun, make a contribution to society, feel valued and value themselves.  Unfortunately, the provision available for young people to pursue these outlets is limited, sometimes expensive and exclusive.

The Dream Foundation has been established as a not-for-profit foundation to provide subsidised or free access for young people to performing arts training and performance opportunities who would otherwise not have access through financial hardship and to raise awareness and support for the challenges facing young people in the 21st century.

One of our first projects this year will be to support one of our students during her gap year in Africa where she will be teaching dance to young people. Find out more about our upcoming Dance-a-thon event on 17th February to raise money for Mary and also Bailey Sarwa who has life threatening cancer and needs special treatment.

We are passionate about the role that dance and performing arts can have in raising awareness about social issues and have a multitude of ideas to support and involve young people, shake up their perceptions of themselves, and help them realise what they are capable of achieving and find their own identity and voice in society.

I Have a Dream

In March 2012, we will be producing a show, “I Have a Dream” at the Arts Depot, London, to promote our campaign.  It will involve our professional company collaborating with other dance groups and include videos produced by the Living the Dream Media Team. 
We want to make people think and show how talented young people are making a positive difference.  We also intend to highlight the young people who are crying for help and want their voices to be heard.   With more support we can make more of a difference to more young people’s lives through the arts!

Dream 100

We are creating a “Dream 100” group of individuals and a “Dream 100” group of businesses.  

We need to raise £100,000 to support a major project to encourage young people to consider careers in the performing arts. We will be approaching targeted schools in disadvantaged areas to nominate 14- to 17-year-olds who have shown evidence of talent and a passion for the performing arts but do not have access to the tuition, facilities and positive role models to enable them to pursue further or higher education.

We just need £500 from 100 people and £500 from 100 businesses to reach our target of £100,000.

Voices Within

As a part of our campaign, in collaboration with Trestle Arts, Living the Dream Media filmed a youth-led project about bullying, in order to produce a DVD for schools. 

The piece was solely directed and performed by young people, performing to a soundtrack of young people’s voices, expressing their feelings about bullying, their identity, fears, pressures and stereotypes.  The DVD includes extracts from interviews with young people and the workshop process in which they took part.  We believe it will be an inspiring and powerful teaching aid for schools, particularly as it has been produced exclusively by young people.  Read more about Voices Within.

Workshops in Schools

We will be raising money through a variety of activities to go into schools to run a range of free workshops helping to raise young people’s self-esteem, confidence and explore the issues they face through the performing arts. Read more about workshops in schools.