Hi and Happy New Year. Sorry for my delay. We have just returned to school today. I have attached 2 photos of the Mural so far and receipts for money spent. This is not the final display as our work is ongoing. The entire central pillar will be covered in our circular mosaic pieces and they will also be dispersed on the walls around. We have had another day's workshop with our visiting artist, Nathalie Elbaba. Students who made Mosaics last years assisted her this year and were involved in peer teaching with younger class groups. There has been really positive feedback from everyone in regards to the colourful visual impact the display is creating in the school, it brightens up a pretty boring walkway. Students are so proud of their work being on show and those that are only starting are really enthusiastic now about what they are doing. Our home school liason officer is now onboard to roll out a similar project to parents. Getting parents involved is a really positive step forward within our school community. Regarding the wider school community (parents, families, neighborhood etc ) it has been very challenging recently and there have been many unfortunate incidents occurring. Our initial theme for the Mosaics was broadly based on culture and Identity, I may or may not broaden this theme when working with parents. This has to be discussed.

Our project has been amazing!!! It has had such a positive impact on students!!! They all genuinely loved the whole process of making their mosaic pieces. I can honestly say, not one student had a negative comment while taking part in the project. They have all been making an extra effort to come in during their free time to complete their pieces. About 50 students have taken part so far. These students are then going to peer teach the whole process to students in classes below them, something they are very eager to do. And on average this could be another 70 students.
The project easily has the capacity to grow and spread throughout the school. We will involve parents once the students have completed their work.
As you can see from our pictures we really have a culturally diverse student population. The process of designing their pieces involved working with classmates and friends from different cultures/countries/backgrounds. Students had to decide how they would represent this visually. In some cases it was a very simple idea, while other groups merged their ideas with more detail and some even became abstract..... and this is the beauty of communicating through art, ie the process naturally becomes entwined into the artwork and the realised art work.
Our project still has some way to go (grow) which I will be glad to share. I hope you like what you see. All these pieces will be mounted to create a large mural.

Hi Rebekah and all at ChangeX.

Here is a picture of our committee.

From L - R Orla Greeves, Barry Devine, Gael Guckian, Samara Keogh, Kevin Whitney

Our project will cultivate a sense of community, culture and belonging. We have 27 nationalities in our school. It is important in society to nurture this sense of working together and looking after one another, no matter where we come from or the colour of our skin. We might come from different lands but we are all on this planet and in this life together. This amazing, colourful art work will be an exploration and celebration of contemporary life.