Developing leadership ability is a priority for the participatory / community arts

4 - there are some great leaders around but there also seems to be an underlying concern about where future leaders are coming from and how they are supported to develop.......perhaps this will evolve in a totally new way but also there is so much experience around to pass on.

Developing peer support is a priority for the participatory arts / community arts

4 - Peer support at different levels could be a good tool for the development of leadership potentials - both in terms of direction and people - I think both questions go hand in hand and are essential for the development and survival (and thrival - it rhymes!).

Right now getting our organisations into beyond survival mode might be a greater priority but the above two questions are part of the wider picture of that.

I am on a committee of square dancers and callers and we have made it a priority to recruit and train new callers and to get our caller training recognised as an NVQ. At present our callers' club and/or Grand Square UK offer one caller school each year. Our work is supported by Awards For All but we are having enormous problems recruiting younger people both as dancers and as callers and, of course, no one can train as a caller without being an experienced dancer. Second obvious problem is reaching minorities (specialist newspapers and magazines for minority groups consistently ignore our press releases). As regards support, after attending caller school, all new callers receive two years of supervision from an experienced caller acting as a mentor. All training is according to the Callerlab syllabus (www.callerlab.org).