The Caribbean Film & Media Academy is in Saint Lucia to launch the Creativity Youth Forum on January 31. The initiative forms part of activities for the Nobel Laureate Festival.
St. Lucia Times caught up with Lisa Wickham, the founder and president of Imagine Media International Limited, the company responsible for the Caribbean Film & Media Academy.
“The creativity and Innovation Youth Forum is really targeted at young people between the ages of 13 and 21.
“Last year we did the Teen Creators Academy (TCA) in Trinidad and Tobago, and I know that young people like the content creation and all of that and it’s fine. But what this is about really, is providing life skills, team building skills, resilience… Skills that I learned as a venture’s scout many years ago, and then we wrap it around the creative arms. So it is really to elevate the level of critical thinking among our young people in the region,” she added.
Wickham says this event builds on the Caribbean legacy of people like Derek Walcott and Sir Arthur Lewis.
“This is why we were happy and when I say we, I’m speaking about Lisa Joseph, may she rest in peace, Don Evelyn, who has a long standing relationship at DBS and the three of us were looking at bringing the program to Saint Lucia and Lisa suggested the Nobel Laureate festival and I immediately said yes,” she explained.
Organisers have targeted young people from various groups and schools who will be engaged in interactive workshops on the day.
Tatiana Ali, known as a child star on the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and is now a highly regarded singer, award-winning producer, actor, businesswoman, and philanthropist will host a session on story-telling.
Dr Vaughn Raspberry, associate Vice Provost for Education at Stanford University will look at scholarship during the session.
“We’re looking at storytelling and scholarship. Do they go together? How do they impact each other? How do we as young people in the region create the narrative of who we are as an identity as our identity,” Wickham put forward.
She also sees the platform as one where a wave of critical thinking is unleashed in the region among young people.
“You know in the 50s and the 60s, we know of our leaders, our forefathers, who had to build the region. I would like to unleash a wave of young people who will see that change, you know, and we see that assertiveness in terms of Caribbean identity and presence in the world and taking our rightful place,” she emphasised.
“So, we will continue to work with the young people in the region in various aspects of creativity, innovation, entrepreneurship, leadership, which we’re doing and in 2027 I’d love to take a group of filmmakers or creatives to the pan-African Film Festival, young people from Saint Lucia and Grenada and St Vincent and other Caribbean islands.”
On the question of the distractions that young people may face due to technology and social media, she says it is a question of feeding young minds with the right things.
“When the children came to the TCA, we made them sign contracts, saying zero tolerance for devices unless they fed into what they were doing. So, it wasn’t the case that you’re sitting there bored, you had to find something to do. There was always something to do and guess what… they did not even miss their phones,” she stated.
“So, I think that we have to fill the gap with things that allow them to be excited by their own level of creativity because in their minds only if it is that, I’m given a choice to scroll and be online on my devices. That’s what I’ll do, but we have to inject it now.”
As someone who was involved in the production of a recent AI music video for Trinidadian soca artiste Shurwayne Winchester, the media entrepreneur says she is not averse to new and emerging technology.
“I believe in embracing the future, embracing the technology, but using it in a way that enhances and builds and it provides something that is better than what we have now,” she explained.
“So, giving them the opportunity, giving them opportunities like this to create and get excited about what they create, I think, is the alternative to just leaving them, or using the technology as a babysitting tool and just leaving them to their own devices.”
The Creativity and Innovation Forum, a hands-on and future focused activity takes place at the Pastoral Centre in Marisule from 8:30 a.m. on Saturday, January 31.
