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Peace Through Music Northern IrelandIn Northern Ireland Since 2004 |
Community Center Classes
Because the majority of children in Northern Ireland attend segregated schools and live in separate communities, we bring children from both sides of the community together through community center-based music classes and concerts. Socialization across secular and ethnic differences through shared activity is crucial to helping children build the common experiences and relationships which serve as a foundation for peace. Our classes were based in two Belfast-area community centers: The An Droichead Irish Community Center and St. Vincent de Paul Afterschool Club. We hope to re-start these classes soon. They included:
- Beginning and Intermediate Harmonica
- Beginning Drum
- Singing
Community Center Staff Training
In keeping with our commitment to sustainable, locally-staffed programs, we are training community center staff and volunteers to conduct our children’s music classes and furnishing classes with free instruments. Staff also receive free ukuleles in their second year in our program. We offer training in the following areas:
- Reading, writing, and counting music
- Beginning and advanced harmonica
- Basic, intermediate, and advanced music pedagogy
- Beginning, intermediate and advanced ukulele
Youth-Teacher Volunteer Program
Person-on-person and random acts of violence are woven into the fabric of everyday life in Northern Ireland, and teenagers are especially vulnerable both to being victims of violence and to being lured into acts of violence. Our youth teacher volunteer program is focused on helping teenagers build their self-esteem, pride, and positive relationships with their own community, as well as to develop a personal commitment to peacemaking. Youth teachers also assist Liz and Community Center Staff in providing music instruction to PTMNI children. Training local youth volunteers allows us to teach more children in more locations. Belfast Youth Volunteers received weekly training in these areas:
- Reading, writing, and counting music
- Singing
- Playing harmonica and ukulele
- Music pedagogy for children, including reading, counting, singing, and playing music
- Lesson planning and reporting
- Conducting
- Tolerance and peace training
Community Concerts
Children participating in our community center programs come together to perform at free community concerts. These concerts serve not only as an important learning experience and confidence-builder for our children, but as a crucial opportunity for tolerant interaction among community members from differing religious background. The father of a child performing at a Belfast Shropshire Music Foundation concert told us: “I never thought that I would see my daughter become friends with Protestant children during my lifetime. It is amazing.”
Ukraine
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Serving Ukrainian Refugees in Poland
At least 12 million people have fled their homes since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. We've established a program for young refugees in Łódź, Poland, teaching harmonica, singing, and ukulele classes while also providing teacher training for teenagers. In a time of severe stress and trauma, our program brings purpose, self esteem, achievement, creativity, fun and joy.
Bangladesh
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Serving Bangladeshi Children & Rohingya Refugees
Currently an astounding 890,000 Rohingya refugees are living in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar region in the largest and most densely populated camps on earth. This crisis has strained an already impoverished country, which has shown unprecedented generosity to the deeply persecuted Rohingya people. PTMI is making a significant impact in the lives of both Rohingya and Bangladeshi children.
Iraq
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Serving Yazidi & Iraqi Youth
Nearly a decade after the Islamic State (ISIS) brutally displaced the ethnoreligious population of Yazidis from their homes, over 280,000 are still languishing in IDP camps in Kurdistan. Since 2022, a group of young adults have flourished in a ukulele class taught online by with help from a young Yazidi volunteer living as a refugee in Germany.
Arizona
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Rescued Afghan Refugees & Unaccompanied Minors
In 2021, hundreds of Afghan families narrowly escaped the brutal Taliban regime to begin new lives in Arizona. PTMI quickly mobilized to provide a comprehensive program to help them begin life in the US in a healthy, positive way. Our program has since expanded to serve unaccompanied minors and other refugees living in the Phoenix area.
Refugee Camps in Greece
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Refugee Camps in Greece
The war in Syria was at the root of the worst refugee crisis since WWII. Children were both targeted and recruited, and families left Syria by the millions. SMF built a program not just for Syrian refugees, but also Kurdish, Afghan and Yazidi children and teenagers-- all in Greek refugee camps. The program provided structure and much-needed opportunities for achievement and self expression.
Northern Ireland
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Peace Through Music Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland schools continue to be 93% segregated between Catholics and Protestants. Bombs explode or are discovered weekly, and riots take place monthly. Murals of men wearing balaclavas and holding guns are on homes and businesses everywhere. Children and adults alike suffer from low self esteem and intolerance as they experience anger and violence daily. SMF is working to bring children together from both sides of the community, forming life-long and life-changing relationships through music.
Utah
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Refugees Living in Salt Lake City
More than 60,000 refugees or "new Americans" live in Utah. Young people must make a difficult adjustment-- learning not only a new language but a whole new way of life. With the help of an incredible group of teenage volunteers, our program Salt Lake City program is reaching young people in the Granite School District.
Kosovo
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Peace Through Music Kosovo
The war in Kosovo ended in 1999, but the affects of this war-- poverty, intolerance, segregation, racism--were experienced every day for many years, especially by children raised in camps and those living in minority communities. For two decades SMF worked with the children and teenagers of Kosovo to develop self esteem, tolerance, and a love of peace through music.
Uganda
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Peace Through Music Uganda
Northern Uganda continues to recover from a brutal civil war in which approximately 66,000 children were kidnapped and forced to become soldiers and 2 million people were displaced internally from 1986 to 2009. Many lived in IDP camps, where they experienced malnutrition and extreme poverty. From 2005 until 2017, The Shropshire Music Foundation ran programs in Gulu and surrounding areas in an IDP camp, 3 primary schools, and 2 high schools that served, among others: former child soldiers, unwanted children born to child soldiers, child mothers, and Night Commuters (children who commuted nightly to evade kidnappers).
