David Lynch’s foundation reportedly is offering $1 million in scholarships for students who want to study meditation at a university in Iowa. Although best known for his dark, disturbing films like Wild at Heart, Blue Velvet, Eraserhead and The Elephant Man, Lynch is also a huge supporter of Transcendental Meditation. His foundation is helping students study special meditation techniques taught at the Maharishi University of Management in Iowa. America has more than enough war colleges promoting the science of destruction. The nation urgently needs at least one university to teach the science of peace and to actually promote peace in the world, Lynch said on his Web site.

Imagine you are walking around your city, and you see an amazing piece of street art in the wall of a building. You go next to it, like in a museum, and take a look at the tag next to the piece of art, identifying the artists, the techniques he used, and also, if you have your iPod in hand, an audioguide track recorded by the artist himself, talking about his art and inspirations.

That’s exactly what we did in Lisbon, with the World’s First Ephemeral Museum. We cataloged more than 100 pieces of street art in 3 major neighborhoods around Lisbon, and with your mp3 player and map in hands, that you previously downloaded from the Ephemeral Museum Website, you can walk the city streets like a real museum.

Every important piece of street art is tagged and identified. This way people could enjoy and understand more Street Art while walking through the biggest museum in the world, the streets of Lisbon.

We are working to open new galleries in Madrid, Barcelona, and São Paulo.

http://www.museuefemero.com/

In the Summer and Autumn 2007, thousands of people living and working in the town of Middlesbrough, Tees Valley participated in a project to increase local food production and reduce food miles. Along the way, young, old, rich and poor worked together, growing food and realising new relationships with local food producers and existing growers in the town and its surrounding area. Their goal has was to pioneer a new sustainable future – not just for Middlesbrough but also for other post-industrial communities across the UK

They were also working to raise awareness of the benefits of and opportunities for growing and securing food for our towns and cities. Local growers need to be connected to existing and new markets, a new relationship needs to be struck between urban and rural, and communities need inspirational and educational ‘soil to plate’ experiences.

Middlesbrough Council and David Barrie, senior producer for Dott 07, have led the project, working in close partnership with Groundwork South Tees, Middlesbrough Primary Care Trust, more than 15 primary and secondary schools, many local community and voluntary sector organisations, and existing allotment growers in the town. It was driven by Bioregional’s commitment to the concept of one planet living, developed in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund and endorsed by the Minister of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

The groups from the schools identified locations in which to grow food and the produce they would like to cultivate. Then, in May 2007, about 1,000 people began growing fruit and vegetables in containers at locations across the town. They received support from local horticulturalists, allotment growers, farmers and food producers. Between June and September, this new team of urban farmers brought their harvested ingredients to a ‘kitchen playground’ event: three week-long blocks of activity in which people prepared, cooked and ate dishes based on ingredients that they had grown themselves. The frenzy of food production culminated in September in a ‘Meal for Middlesbrough’ – a banquet for 1,500 in the town’s main square. Participants in the growing project created the menu from produce they’d harvested. Local producers provided meat and vegetables to supplement the meal, which was cooked and eaten in the open air.

Finally, several containers grown in Middlesbrough were presented at the Dott 07 Festival and participating groups prepared food for visitors in a special-edition kitchen playground.

A fantastic sustainable idea which involves everyone from the local community and has endless amounts of benefits.

http://www.dott07.com/go/food/urban-farming

RockCorps was launched as a social business in the United States in 2005 by 7 friends: Stephen Greene (CEO), Grady Lee (COO), Haley Moffett (Head of Production), Chris Robinson (Creative Director), Toby Garrett (Producer), Paul Hunter and Noel Eisenberg. Volunteers have earned their tickets to RockCorps gigs in cities across the US including New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Oakland, Houston, Chicago, Portland OR, Baltimore, Washington DC and Miami.

In 2008 RockCorps partnered with Orange and Sony Ericsson to bring RockCorps to the UK. The first concert took place on September 26th at the Royal Albert Hall featuring Busta Rhymes, Ludacris and John Legend. In 2009, RockCorps has grown in the UK with gigs at the Manchester Apollo and again at the Royal Albert Hall. 2009 also saw the the first RockCorps show in France at Le Zenith theatre in Paris.

RockCorps has over 450 charity and non-profit partners in the US and Europe. All of the volunteering events are done in partnership with and for the benefit of local charities.

All of RockCorps funding comes from its brand partners. Orange is RockCorps’ lead partner in the UK and France, both supporting the programme directly and also delivering communications campaigns to help spread the word and inspire a new generation of volunteers. Young people have to give 4 hours of their time to put back into the community, and for their hard work they get given a ticket to a music gig with big name artists playing – the idea is as simple as that.

I was at the Royal Albert Hall for this year’s RockCorps and the atmosphere was amazing, everyone having a good time and feeling good about helping out with the community.

As the idea of RockCorps has already spread from America to the UK and now to Paris, it’s surely only a matter of time before it starts heading to Asia? Japan for instance, where the elderly make up a big part of the population could easily be the type of place where RockCorps works its magic, with the young helping the old.

Give, Get Given.

http://www.rockcorps.com/

http://www.orangerockcorps.co.uk/

Back in 2008, a delegation from India, Nepal and Morocco toured across five African countries to discuss and find ways to eliminate child labour. The concept was based around a ‘tour bus’ and ‘hands on’ concept, not just talking to solve the problem of child labour in Africa. Check the website below for all information about the idea. You can download the PDF final report of the project here.

http://www.stopchildlabour.eu/africatour2008/

The British DJ & MC Academy is a fresh, innovative, youth arts social enterprise that has been set up since February 2008, starting from an eight-week course with just five students. Now, more than 2,000 young people have now been involved and the Academy is having an impact on the estates and communities of the streets of London.

DJ Trickles (Krissy Simms) & Lady MC (Kerry O’Brien), both award nominees and artists for fourteen years, who have hosted their own radio show on the award winning Kool FM started the Academy. They worked together for five years and decided to set-up the academy to help other young artists who find it hard to get into the business. As the organisation developed, the duo realised that music was a huge engagement tool to capture young people who may be at risk from negative activities and going down the wrong path. They music to guide young people back into education, training or simply by offering positive activities to express emotions and to be used as a positive channel deterring reactive behaviour and attitudes.

The academy is now working in partnership with two colleges, the top three housing associations in the UK, seven boroughs across London and over ten youth organisations and charities targeting young people aged 11-25 of all ethnic backgrounds, who are not in education or training. Youth can take part in workshops and accreditations up-to BTEC and NVQ Level 4. The courses offered range from radio presenting, music production, positive lyrical writing to drama and dance workshops.

The Academy is unique because we guarantee on-going support in any area of young people’s lives through partnership organisations, who work as referrals to offer sustainability using the courses as a stepping stone. The academy is supported by KAM and RWD Magazine, which offer free materials for the young people and features in the magazine. In return, people perform at their events such as the Plasa Exhibition 2008 and Notting Hill Carnival.

http://www.djandmcacademy.com/