Culture and arts facilitators play a central role in the implementation of AoP programmes as culture and arts are the essences of the programmes. It’s important as a culture and arts facilitators to be motivated and interested in designing activities to the programme’s target audience. It is also important to have the skills and the willingness to adapt and modify the activities to the needs of the target audience.
To be a culture and arts facilitator it is preferable to have expertise and passion in one or more culture or arts categories that can be included in the AoP programme, such as art, music, theatre literature etc. Culture and arts facilitators should embrace and engage persons with mental health issues and persons who may have little knowledge or prior experience of culture and arts.
When developing activities for the programme, it is highly recommended to collaborate with the programme’s link worker, healthcare, or social professionals or with culture and arts facilitators who have previous experience of such programmes, to ensure the activities are appropriate for the target audience. This is to prevent that the activities are not technically difficult for the target audience or could trigger difficult emotional situations for some participants.
The roles and task of the culture and arts facilitator is to create culture and arts activities that appeal to the target audience. The culture and arts facilitators, together with the link worker, creates a safe and encouraging environment where all participants are considered and treated equal.