Testimonials

Incidentally one of the Walking Footballers who attended the last performance was so inspired that he got checked out and sure enough he had Prostate Cancer – in the early stages – and is on the road to recovery. He wanted me to thank you for ‘saving his life’.

Thanks very much for … your continued hard work, partnership and commitment to making London a fairer and safer place.

I absolutely enjoyed every minute! The only thing I would change is for it to be longer as everyone (adults and children) were fully engaged the whole time! Loved it! Thank you so much!

The play was delivered very well and captured the year group’s attention about a topic that is and will become more relevant as they get older… [it] offered an alternative voice to a teacher’s helping them to identify risks and begin to mitigate them. It was an effective vehicle to get the message across about the dangers of keeping secrets.

I have been meaning to email you since Arc Theatre's counter hate and extremism performance back in November. It was AMAZING and it linked beautifully to all that we do in school. Nearly all topics were covered from history (Year 6 have just started WW2, so this was an excellent introduction to the topic), to computing and internet safety and not forgetting wellbeing and citizenship - during citizenship fortnight we have been looking at protected characteristics - this too was addressed during the production. Lots of excellent discussions were had back in class. So thank you very much to all involved. On the day itself, one of the main characters [was called away] … and the narrator had to step in at the last minute. She was absolutely brilliant! I cannot speak highly enough about this production and this was echoed by all staff who had the chance to watch it. We look forward to working with you again!

Joanne Guleroglu - Class Teacher & More Able Lead

St Francis’ Catholic Primary School, Newham

14 years ago when I was working as a mentor for the Dalston Youth Project, I was mentoring a 16-year-old boy who was starting to get involved in the youth justice system. He had never been to the theatre before and I took him to see [Arc Theatre’s] Boy X. This was completely out of his comfort zone and I didn't know if he would even be able to sit in an auditorium for an hour. Boy X however had a dramatic impact on him. Not only did he see some parallels which led him to think about his life in a way he hadn't before, but it also ignited a love of acting, he went on and did some himself. It was by no means a quick fix for him, but Boy X was certainly a catalyst for some changes. There were bumps along the way but he turned his life around quite dramatically in the years afterwards. He is now a 30-year-old father of three, working hard and having left that life behind, where some of his peers have not been so lucky. I have been lucky enough to keep him in my life and am now godmother to his children and proud to call him a close friend. I have now had [Arc’s] Boy X back to perform their reworked piece at the Alternative Provision where I now work. We work with some of the most challenging young people in Hertfordshire who have experienced a lot of trauma and many are involved in criminal behaviour. These young people rarely attend an assembly and certainly not one that is an hour long but they stayed for the entire performance and were completely engaged. This work is so important and it's rare to find external providers who provide meaningful workshops on a level that these young people can connect with. Many are patronising or run by people who don't seem to understand, or even like, young people so Arc stand out as an organisation that really 'get' these young people. I look forward to working with them again in the future.

Ms Charli Faux - Emotional and Social Development Lead/PSHE Lead

Links Academy, Herts

I just wanted to drop you an email to say that I thoroughly enjoyed my visit to see your project yesterday! Nat and her team were simply amazing. The content was clearly thoughtfully tailored towards the age cohort and the children maintained attention throughout – which is not always an easy task! I was impressed at how seamlessly Nat managed to cover so many aspects of the SEF focus areas. It’s very rare to find a project that can cover discrimination, prejudice, British values, polarisation, online harms, misinformation and extremism all in one session so adeptly. I felt that the team did a fantastic job of contemporising the themes explored through the second world war into a modern-day context that is perhaps more familiar for the children. It’s clear having heard some of the children speaking, that the session was very impactful and directly addressed some of the issues these children are currently experiencing – especially around misinformation. It was great to see young people receive a truly exceptional bit of delivery in counter extremism!

Stewart Bennett - Countering Terrorism and Countering Extremism Hub

Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC)