Schools Programme

Short Film Otago also aims to promote script writing amongst young people.

We are keen to encourage students at secondary schools in the Otago Province to write short films.

Short Film Otago Schools Club
Extending the SFO programme into the region’s secondary schools

At a national level, the NZ Film Commission has identified that few film funding applications come to it from the southern region.

Currently, various film training and development programmes operate within the region, but the development path is fragmented, inconsistent, and generally hard to find.

The Short Film Otago Charitable Trust has been working since 2006 to bridge the gap, funding and supporting 16 films to date with two more currently in production.

In the process, Short Film Otago has identified a gap between film training offered in schools, and applications flowing in to Short Film Otago from students. The great majority of script entries identified for support by SFO come from older writers and film-makers.

Beginning in 2017, SFO is moving to address this with a new Short Film Otago Schools Club programme.

The programme centres on a series of extra-curricular workshops with aspiring film-makers in secondary schools, to support and guide Club members in developing film ideas for submission into SFO funding rounds.

This is expected to raise awareness of the SFO initiative among students and teachers, enhancing the flow of short film ideas which are also more developed, as well offering invaluable experience and guidance to students with an interest in film making.

The initiative is part of a broader objective of developing a vertically integrated, southern pathway from school to the professional screen industry.

A pilot SFO Film Club programme began in a Dunedin secondary school in February 2017. If the pilot proves successful, it is intended to seek to roll the programme out across the region in conjunction with interested schools.

Delivery of the programme in schools is expected to be self-funding from existing school funding programmes.

Short Film Otago Schools Resource Kit

Short Film Otago worked with Media Studies teachers to develop a package of learning resources to support teachers who already encourage their students to explore short films.

The schools resource was completed and mailed out to schools in 2011 and has been well received.

In its six modules the resource focuses on the ideas and story stages of the short film process.

Using interviews with the writers of four of our own shorts as well as Robert Sarkies (Otago’s foremost maker of shorts before he began his feature film career) and Louis Sutherland and Mark Albiston who wrote The Six Dollar Fifty Man (New Zealand’s most successful short in 2010) it explores where to look for ideas and how to turn an idea into a story.

Separate modules are devoted to two golden rules “something must happen” and “endings are vital”.

In each module there is a suggestion of activities for students.