Palestinian Circus

PCS is an arts education and creation organization. The organization was founded in 2007. The mission of PCS is to support the educational and personal development of children in challenging and underprivileged circumstances, and to promote the empowerment of youth through the arts while assisting them to become positive actors in society. PCS currently works with 250 children and young adolescents, offering them - on average - 100 hours of circus classes on a yearly basis, through weekly circus clubs and yearly summer camps. PCS develops circus shows that it tours locally and internationally as a way to spread hope, pride and dignity among the Palestinian population and to develop and promote the Palestinian creativity. The main reason to start circus in Palestine was indeed to complement the traditional education system in providing a pedagogical approach that focuses on matters absent in the official curricula: coping mechanisms, values, life learning skills, self-esteem, teamwork, trust, equality. PCS wanted to offer to children and youth programs to be engaged in meaningful creative activities in which they can channel their energies into constructive activism, and where they find a healthy value based reference to develop their identities and contribute to a more just society. Nowadays PCS is based in Birzeit, where there are the administrative offices and the main training location (including a professional circus tent), and employees 13 full time staff and 2 free lance staff members. From the 13 full time, 6 people are in the administration / coordination field, while the other 7 form the pedagogical and artistic team of the school.