We raise awareness of the consequences of truancy and non-school attendance, by engaging with children and young people using drama productions.

Who we are…
7 year 11 students from Lea Manor High School in Luton.

Where we’re based…
Luton, Bedfordshire

When we started…
July 2004

How we started…
Our Youth Worker and Education Welfare Officer were looking at creative ways to address the ongoing problem of truancy/non-school attendance. The Truancy Awareness Project (TAP) was then set up with the support of the Youth Service and the Education Welfare Service and Lea Manor High School.

Our work…
We started off by studying the effects of truancy, which became in a 6-month project with the finale being a huge Truancy Awareness Day at school. From this we created a dram called ‘Just One More Day’ which we now tour around Luton Primary schools. So far we have performed to 18 schools. We meet weekly after school to plan and rehearse our performances and look at what changes we need to make depending on our audience. Some of us do admin and design posters, and others speak in assemblies and perform the drama. It been really exciting to perform our drama from foundation class to Year 11 students. We have even had interest from other nearby towns.

Future plans…
We are committed to keeping the message alive, by continuing to recruit new ‘Tappers’ and look at different ways to sell our message. In 2007 we plan to look into the possibility of turning our drama into a book.

For more information…
01582 579 714
farmerl@luton.gov.uk


“Instead of standing and talking at people, we find it’s far better to deliver a drama within the assembly time. Within our team we all play an important part and it has helped us to improve our confidence and self esteem.”
Jessica Ronald, 15, on behalf of the TAP team