Students unveil final cut of St Albans Museum project at special screening

Students from Oaklands College gave the first screening of a short film they have been working on in collaboration with St Albans Museum team at Verulamium in an exclusive screening at the prestigious museum. 

Students from the College’s Supported Learning and Media department collaborated on the project to create a new educational video for first time visitors to the museum. The screening was the first public showing of the final cut, which will now be shared by the museum with visitors both onsite and online. 

Over 40 friends, family and colleagues of the students and museum came together to watch the film, joined by Mayor of St Albans City and District, Councillor Mohammad Iqbal Zia. 

After the screening, students Derin Chambers, Mark Stafford, Tom Clark and David Silva received certificates to mark their involvement with the project, presented by the Mayor. 

Leading the project for the film’s stars is Supported Leaning Work Placement Officer Rhys Wynne, who developed the idea after first delivering Autism awareness training to the museum team last summer. 

He said: “To remember our very first meeting to discuss the project through to seeing the students here to celebrate their work surrounded by friends and family is a great feeling. Our students have loved the opportunity to play such a key role in this project and have built a great relationship with the museum team.”

Filming and editing was delivered by three Foundation Degree Media students Alex Kosky, Jessica Gray and Tamryn Swart, who used their skills and expertise in filmmaking to collate footage and edit to the museum’s requirements. 

Level 5 student Jessica said: “We’ve really enjoyed working on this project, and it’s been really nice to see it shown here tonight. Before this we had little experience of working with people younger than us and working alongside people with additional needs. It helped improve our communication skills and encouraged us to create a real collaborative process. The museum has been great in giving us clear direction so we had creativity but knew we met their expectation too.”

The film will now be used as a warm welcome for visitors to the museum over the coming months, with possible further projects in the pipeline for students to work with the museum later in the year. 

Eleanor Payne, Learning and Interpretation Officer at Verulamium Museum said: “”Working on this film project with Oaklands College has been a real joy.  All the students worked so well together and have created an amazing resource for us that they should be immensely proud of.”

You can view the video online  here.