FESTIVAL EXPERIENCE PROGRAM

Overview

Festival Experience Program is an alternative approach for developing individual or collective work ethics + culture in cultural spaces and elsewhere. By enabling a practical working environment for the next generation of working professionals through a self-tailored unique skill development initiative to ideate agency, acknowledgment, authenticity, perseverance and intrapreneurship.

The world is experiencing disruption and uncertainty as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that change will likely continue and accelerate. The increased demand for planning and change enablement across all organisations is being majorly influenced by this. Many organizations are finding themselves asking this question in the new era of operation: “How do we create a work culture of change?”

We then began to consider how we could develop a diverse post-pandemic workplace culture for everyone worldwide who is in need of assistance or looking for a way to self-assemble in order to survive in this new(unknown) thread. The program is an experimental way to explore this idea of looking for the solutions that the human race as a whole is seeking.

Modern organizations and their working culture is constantly mutating from one stream to another. This transformational work culture requires a rigorous change strategy that includes all the preparation and alteration needed to guarantee that people, processes, and technology are in sync.

We believe learning, participation, and individual ownership all work together to create a culture of change enablement and people enablement. We aim to design for better planning and ensure change enablement is well-positioned to leverage technology to facilitate process improvements, making people more engaged, efficient, creative and productive.

Festival Experience Program would be a pathway to enable you for your professional journey. This is a standalone initiative by SPHERE which aims to create a new beginning for professional skill development through building an on-work pedagogical architecture and constant learning by experimenting and exploring ideas, strategies, and implementational methods.

This program is open for everyone across the world but we would highly encourage applications from applicants living in any of the Global South countries or identifying as any of the special groups [LGBTQ, Unaddressed or indigenous communities, communities/ individuals struggling economically or doesn’t have sufficient digital/ technological accessibility, people who are affected by the political, national, continental and international turbulences etc.] who require additional attention to acknowledge the humanitarian crisis.

Application Link: Click here.

Eligibility Criteria

Open to everyone across the world over 18 years old
Preferably applicants who are currently pursuing an undergraduate/graduate program
Alternatively, we encourage applications from anyone who is looking for a career shift and interested in exploring the festival sector [specifically the democratized art institutional space] are welcome to apply.

We are a space for anyone and everyone, therefore we won’t ask you about where you come from but we are interested in where you want to go – if you are seeing this then we want you to know you would be treated as equal to everyone and we can’t wait to know you more

The Pathways

Please note: You have the liberty to choose one of your favorite pathways and we will add you to one more pathway to give you a more diverse experience in the Program.

Kindly find a brief description for each pathway –

Visual Communication Design

The visual communication design team will use visual elements to convey ideas, information, and data, precisely they will be responsible for how media can communicate better with people. The team will be learning to use media such as photos, videos, graphs, typography, charts, maps, illustrations, and so much more.

Data and Technology Design

The data designer determines what and where data must be stored and how the data elements interrelate. The team facilitates information delivery by translating complex information into information that users can easily read and understand. You will be working closely across the mediums of data analysis, web interface, technological interactions and user experience.

Innovation and Inclusion Design

Innovation design thinking is a human-centred approach to innovation — anchored in understanding the community’s needs, rapid prototyping, and generating creative ideas that will transform the way we experience/ deliver services, processes, and organizations. Whereas, Inclusion Design describes methodologies to create spaces that understand and enable people of all backgrounds and abilities. The inclusive design may address accessibility, age, culture, economic situation, education, gender, geographic location, language, and race.

Global Relationship and Networking Design

An institutional ecosystem consists of a network of interlinked organizations that dynamically interact with each other through competition and cooperation to grow sustainability and survive. The team of network designers will be in a mutual agreement to work with a singular motivation. Through these partnerships, institutions help one another to increase brand exposure, break into new markets, and add extra value to products/services while creating pathbreaking dimensions of business relationships.

Program and Audience Design

Festival programmers select the works or innovate new forms of ideas for festival programming. Diversity is key. They create a balance of tone and form and aim to start a conversation with the audience or to draw attention to lesser-known films. Whereas, audience design is a method and process of designing a message that will impact an audience in the most desired fashion. This team is also responsible for writing and critiquing and publishing critical content.

Artistic Communication, PR and Media Design

The artistic Communication team will be responsible for creating multiple drafts for communications with artists and other stakeholders. Whereas Advertising, Public Relations and Media Design team will be responsible for public awareness of the festival through various platforms including of publications and announcements across platforms and mediums. They will also be responsible for press releases and the creation of the official press kit for the festival.

For each pathway, you will be closely working with the core team behind the festival + organisation.

Application Guidelines

We are only accept applications through the application portal. No other medium of application will be considered. To apply for the Festival Experience Program for the World Cinema Carnival, use the online form provided.

Provide a Motivation Video (of max 3 minutes). The video does not need to be professionally recorded. Please upload the video to YouTube or Vimeo and submit it as a link in the above form.
A Written Expression of Interest (up to 300 words)

Contact us at fep@spherefestival.com, if you have any further questions.

FAQs

Mode of operation

The entire program will be conducted digitally. No physical interactions and travel is required.

Fees and Monetary commitment

There is no application and no participation fees are attached to this program. This is a collective process of learning, sharing, and growing together without any monetary compensation from both ends.

Key Application Deadlines

We accept applications on-rolling basis throughout the year

Earliest Deadline: 31st May, 2023.

Fall Deadline: 15th September, 2023

Winter Deadline: 31st December, 2023

Spring Deadline: 15th March, 2024

But if you are willing to gain your experience during the World Cinema Carnival, then the latest date of application is 31st May, 2023.

Individuals who are D/deaf, alternatively abled, or neurodivergent are encouraged to apply, and we will work together in addressing accessibility requirements.

We acknowledge that candidates may need to implement exceptional or atypical arrangements, and we will work cooperatively to satisfy requirements.

In order to guarantee that we receive your application in written or spoken English, please use the medium that is most accessible to you (either written or through video).

Please inform us about the sort of access support you might need during the delegation in a part of the application. It’s crucial that you fill out this information in the application form so that we have the data we need to provide you with access, should that be necessary.

Access Needs

Selection Procedure

A Note on Program Commitment

FEP (Festival Experience Program) is a self-tailored program that comes with the flexibility of time and commitment. You can assemble your time and commitment to your schedule, needs and other commitments. FEP has four categorial options to choose from in terms of gaining the experience – Four (04), Six (06), Eight (08) or Twelve (12) weeks. Participants can choose their journey in the program in any of the consecutive weeks mentioned above.
Additional note –
If you choose the six weeks term for your experience, but can’t continue the program until the end of six weeks – there are two alternatives:
- In case you enrol for six weeks of experience and continue until 5 weeks and decide to conclude the program then you will be recovering four weeks of experience certificate of completion.
- If you continue until 5 weeks and 3 days then we can consider your contribution for six weeks, given your performance and innovative approach.
- Please note here 5 is considered as the mean value of 4 and 6. This example was given considered only if certain situations arrive in the process.
This Program requires a commitment of a minimum of 5-8 hours per week to successfully fulfil the criteria of the Program. Though, we suggest a responsibility of approximately 10 hours per week to cover all the margins and stages of the program.
In exceptional cases, we may consider fewer hours if that translates to an equivalent amount of work completed for that respective timeline.
Please note: The time mentioned here is an equitable value given the assignment and activities attached to the Program. In most cases, we won’t count the hours of your commitment but qualitatively evaluate the participation and completion of the assignments.
Example: Ideal format of the answer should be: 10 hours/per week

Variable Advantages

Four (4) Weeks – Certificate of completion + Career guidance + Networking with the larger community at SPHERE

Six (6) Weeks – Certificate of Completion + Career guidance + Networking with the larger community at SPHERE + Certificate of Experience – Pathway specific

Eight (8) Weeks – Certificate of Completion + Career guidance + Networking with the larger community at SPHERE + Certificate of Experience – Pathway specific [This will be shown as professional experience] + Letter of Recommendation [can be requested throughout the year, starting date should be calculated from the end date of the program]

Twelve (12) Weeks – Certificate of Completion + Certificate of Experience – Pathway specific [This will be shown as professional experience] + Letter of Recommendation [can be requested throughout the year, starting date should be calculated from the end date of the program] + Will be considered for SPHERE’s additional programming facilities + Invitation only Board Membership as an observer for a year [starting date should be calculated from the end date of the program, Your observer role can be upgraded depending on your contribution and innovative approach to your position during the board membership period]