Award-winning playwright explores classroom bullying and teachers' responses.
Includes Teachers' Resources to aid structured discussion and exploration of the themes raised in schools, colleges and beyond. Care Takers is part of an Edge Hill University (Birmingham, UK) research project on homophobia. The team invites everyone, after seeing or reading (or both ) the play, to give feedback by completing the online survey, here (10 minutes).
Care Takers included on a programme of International Health and Humanities Conference, Health Humanities: Creative Practices as Care (September 2016): a growing worldwide interdisciplinary dialogue across diverse communities of arts and humanities academics and practitioners, clinicians, informal carers, service users and the self-caring public. Conference details are here.
The play is great for use as a source text for all those interested in the impact of creative practices in health, psychological well-being and enhancing social inclusion of people. Includes: hospitals, social and community centres, mental health centres, schools, and museums.


Ms Lawson, a new teacher at Newall South High School, believes Jamie Harrow is being bullied because he's gay. She wants to help but Mrs Rutter, the Deputy Head, thinks it will sort itself out. Is Mrs Rutter speaking from experience or is there something more unsavoury about her uncaring attitude? A battle royale occurs between youthful idealism and the system that evolves to choke it.


Most plays that deal with homophobia in schools look at the children in the playground, but what happens when the people in charge of our children are homophobic? Care Takers is an intense two-hander that follows a new teacher who tries to do something about one of her pupils who is being bullied for being gay.


Homophobia remains a fault-line in our society and especially in our multicultural, inner-city schools where original research undertaken by writer Billy Cowan showed these tensions are still very real. The play shows how complicated things have become for teachers in these schools when it comes to dealing with homophobic bullying, and how vulnerable young gay people still are in these environments - especially if the system gets in the way of their safety.


Winner of The Stage Edinburgh Award 2016 and Critic's Choice in The Stage's Best of the Fringe selection.
--Billy Cowan