Imagine you are a multi-disciplinary artist who loves to paint;

I draw; collage; write; sew; sing; dance; drum and the rest! You are employed to be part of a project in which you have three days training, which basically tell you that your job remit is to go into a school with children of any age and create something which celebrates ethnically diverse Wales. The Cynefin project has been an inspirational privilege to be part of, particularly as someone who is not phased by the lack of a plan! Born out of the Welsh Government’s Anti-racist Action Plan and new curriculum, the Cynefin project created by The Arts Council of Wales has now worked with 145 schools across Wales, looking at diversity, inclusivity and belonging. Each of my three rounds of Cynefin has begun with a conversation with the young people on who belongs in Wales? What are the criteria? And more importantly, who gets to decide who belongs?

In two out of my four initial sessions, students felt empowered to come out to their peers as transgender and or non-binary, and in a session last week a year 6 student told his peers for the first time that he was Muslim. At secondary school age, pupils have felt confident enough to share some of the shocking abuse they have suffered – often under the guise of “banter”, and where there is racism there is often also homophobia, transphobia. I feel proud that in sharing some of my experiences growing up jewel heritage (my self-definition having been defined as “half caste” or “mixed race”), that other young people feel empowered to share their truth. It’s interesting to note that student voices can be expansive, diverse, and rich with thoughtful ideas, whether the pupils in the schools are diverse or not.

Molara, is also Chair of Black History Wales 365.

Molara Awen

And there lies the default position of many schools, headteachers and teachers... “our school isn’t diverse so we don’t need to do this work” or “we don’t have a problem with racism as we don’t have any brown children”. NOTHING could be further from the truth, and in many cases there’s a profound lack of awareness as to what racism or actually is, or the different ways in which it manifests itself. Sadly the only three brown skinned members of staff working in the Welsh education system I know in person, are either battling so called “unconscious bias”, micro-aggressions and feeling undervalued, and in two cases have resigned as a result of it. I am frequently the first brown skinned person in a teaching position that students have ever encountered, and brown skinned children frequently seek out those of us working on Cynefin, to share some of their lived experiences for the first time. In my first project Making Waves, Waves of Change, much to the shock of their amazing English teacher, the cohort of year 8 students a Morriston Comprehensive decided to write a book aimed at fellow teenagers who may be suffering.

Each contributor designed their waves, and contributed a piece of writing, historical to creative, factual to poetic, depending on their area of interest, alongside uplifting messages to peers across the country: In my second project with 7 and 8 years olds we looked at international stories of migration, including the nativity, as we celebrated the people who passed through the town of Rhayader . throughout the ages. We created a collage of the rivers Elan and Claerwen, the flooding and dams, and took a trip inside Pen y Garreg, courtesy of the Elan Valley trust. We are so used to white centric stories it was great to learn that people from as far as Australia and South Africa had worked on the dams, that the workers village foreman was Greek and enforced shaved heads, vaccinations and quarantine before workers were allowed into the village! I’m currently working with a group of year 7 students at Ysgol Bro Preseli on a youth centric version of the Welsh government’s Anti-Racist Action Plan(T), as the original document is 128 pages of predominantly legalese writing “with no pictures”. We have written to Jeremy Miles and are hoping to deliver it to the Senedd.

All of the best projects I would describe as ripples in a pool, creating changes in attitude not just in the pupils and teachers working on Cynefin, but in schools and communities. Viva Cynefin!