Ministers Catherine Martin and Roderic O’Gorman have approved €250,000 to extend the impact of the Fighting Words Story Seeds programme.

The programme is designed to help young people articulate their own life stories so that they can understand their own experiences and their place in the world. Through creative writing, Story Seeds strengthens positivity in children and helps them to reimagine the negatives in their lives and transform their sense of place and possibility.

This additional €250,000 will be provided by the Creative Ireland Programme of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media and the What Works initiative, supported by the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth and funded under Dormant Accounts; to extend the Story Seeds programme of creative writing activity.

Providing free tutoring/mentoring in creative writing and related arts to as many children, young adults and adults with special needs as they can reach, Fighting Words help people discover and harness the power of their own imaginations and creative writing skills.

The Story Seeds initiative has been running in 22 primary schools in Dublin’s north inner city and north city during 2021, and will now extend to secondary schools and youth groups in the area.

"I loved reading the work the Story Seeds project produced in Dublin's north inner city, and I'm really looking forward to what gets written by children and young people in other parts of the country when they start making Story Seeds their own"

This new funding will also enable Fighting Words to greatly expand the programme and bring the Story Seeds project to 14,000 children and young people in 120 primary schools, 70 secondary schools and 30 youth and additional needs groups in Dublin West, Dublin South inner city, Cork City, Limerick City, Bray/Wicklow and Drogheda.

Fighting Words will be linking with those organisations working in the areas of disadvantage, social marginalisation, mental health, disability, ethnic minorities and refugees/migrants. Fighting Words will also liaise with Tusla, the Children and Young People Service Committees (CYPSCs), and with Garda Community officers to ensure they are connecting with as many youth organisations as possible in each region.

Find out more about Creative Ireland and Fighting Words, here.

Read more about Story Seeds here.