Don't Settle is a project of Beatfreeks that empowers young people of colour to change the voice of heritage through the arts, research and governance. Don’t Settle is a three year project funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund as part of the Kick the Dust Scheme. We are partnered with Birmingham City University (BCU), Birmingham Museums Trust (BMT), Chance Heritage Trust (CHT), and Roundhou
se Birmingham. Cultural and heritage institutions are where people go to learn about the past, observe how society has progressed, and to reflect on our society today. The histories and narratives presented in these institutions should therefore be inclusive of communities of colour and told from numerous perspectives in order to truly reflect the multicultural society of Birmingham and the Black Country. We believe that inclusivity should be applied as an attitude and approach to different levels of heritage organisations, thus advocating for more sustainable attempts at decolonisation. This means centering young people of colour as target audience, as people actively doing the work, as consultants and as thinkers. We want to ensure that young people of colour are not only given platforms in this project but also given the autonomy in the project. By giving true autonomy over, young people of colour will be empowered to make the changes and lead the development they want to see in the heritage sector. n order to truly give autonomy and achieve change together, we believe codesign and co-production are needed. These drive our organisation Beatfreeks, and also this project specifically in terms of processes and methodology. We try and ensure that codesign takes place in as many areas of the project as possible. Examples include codesign on ideas between partners and cohorts of young people, codesigning commissions and briefs, co-producing all of our public facing events, and even codesigning our Theory of change with young people.
