Y Touring Theatre Company is Central YMCA’s award winning Touring Theatre Company, whose Theatre of Debate® programme has brought to the fore controversial scientific issues through theatre.
Nobody Lives Forever by Judith Johnson is a play about stem cell research and has been developed in partnership with the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC) and is supported by the Medical Research Council (MRC), the Department of Health, Action Medical Research and Central YMCA. The play toured nationwide from October to December 2008.
Schools that received the production were asked to create two short digital films, one for and one against the stem cell research debate in response to the performance in their school.
A selection of these films were then shown at the Arena of Debate when the Royal Albert Hall was transformed into a debating chamber for young people from all over the country. The overall aim of this project was to engage young people in an informed debate and to explore the social, moral, scientific and political questions raised by stem cell research.
Nobody Lives Forever was researched and developed as a teacher resource designed to support the achievement of attainment targets outlined in Key Stages 4 in Science, English, Drama, RS and PSHE. Online teacher and student resources support the play, and can be accessed here.
The Arena of Debate was made possible by the generous support of John Robinson and Dr Derek Stubbs.
On Thursday 2 April 2009 the Royal Albert Hall was transformed into a debating chamber for young people to discuss the issues surrounding stem cell research. The Debating Arena included world leaders in the field of stem cell research and was hosted by Dr Mark Lythgoe and Vivienne Parry.
The panel for the motion was:
Dr Sophie Petit-Zeman
Professor Lewis Wolpert
Professor Chris Mason
The panel against the motion was:
Josephine Quintavalle
Dr Calum MacKellar
Dr Donald Bruce
Films were shown from Bellahouston School in Glasgow, Brentside High School, Lumen Christi College in Londonerry, Mulberry School for Girls and Quintin Kynaston. Check back soon to see these!
Y Touring Theatre Company
Y Touring Theatre Company, established in 1989, is an operation of Central YMCA, the world's leading activity for health charity and the first YMCA. Through creating high quality theatre and drama, we aim to highlight important, often difficult, current issues and empower our audiences of young people and adults to generate change in themselves, others and society.
Y Touring Website