Tanio Secures Funding to Develop Leading Climate Change Project

Community arts charity Tanio has secured funding to develop a new Forest Arts project focusing on climate change. Developed in partnership with Heronsbridge School in Bridgend, the project will explore how young people can make a positive impact on the planet.

Tanio combines the celebrated educational techniques of Forest School exploratory learning with a focus on arts and creativity. Tanio’s certified Forest School leaders will guide pupils in arts-based activities designed to help them examine the outdoors, teach them about climate change, and express their feelings on the complex topic. The children will be empowered to make wise choices about how they take care of our planet.

Funding for the project comes from BAVO via the Integrated Care Fund: Children and Young People Revenue Grant, the Arts Council of Wales and the Welsh Government, and will run in partnership with Renew Wales. The project will sit alongside Tanio’s recently launched Spring Forward initiative, which improves wellbeing and emotional literacy for young people.

Each session will include elements of art, a beginning and ending emotional check-in, and activities designed to explore climate change in a realistic but empowering way.

Delivery of the project will take place primarily in Heronsbridge School, as well as trialling the project at The Bridge school in Bridgend.

Lisa Davies, Chief Executive of Tanio, said: “We are extremely excited to be given the opportunity to lead on such an exciting project. Climate change is an important subject now more than ever, and needs to be brought to the forefront in the education of our young people. We have worked with Heronsbridge School on past projects and love working with them, so to be able to develop this project in partnership with them is a collaboration we’re very excited about.

“We’re also looking forward to working alongside Renew Wales on this development. They do great work with not only informing communities about the threat of the climate crisis, but giving advice on what can be done to help on both an individual and larger level. Renew are advocating for action to be taken against the climate crisis in Wales, and we are excited to see what they will bring to the project.”

Tanio’s Programme Manager for Arts & the Environment, Events & Performances, Alicia Stark, added: “The Spring Forward project that Tanio delivered at Heronsbridge last year was received very well, and we look forward to developing this new project around climate change with them.”