Earlier this year BFI announced the UK Government’s Young Audiences Content Fund (YACF), revealing the team, led by Head of Fund Jackie Edwards, which will deliver the three-year pilot fund of up to £57 million.

This fund has the potential to foster a change in the creation of original content for young people in the UK, particularly under the guidance of Jackie and her team.

The three-year pilot for the YACF will support original programming, in both live-action and animation, and across all genres including entertainment, education, fiction and drama, arts and culture, factual and religion. One of the priorities of the Fund is to support content that reflects UK cultural identity and the nations and regions – both on screen and off screen – and content in UK indigenous languages.

This event is an opportunity for content producers to find out more about the ambitions and priorities of the fund from Jackie directly, and take part in an audience Q&A.

More details about the Youth Audiences Content Fund can be found here.

Schedule

15:00-15:30 - Briefing

15:30-16:00 - Audience Q+A

16:00-16:30 - Tea and coffee

Jackie Edwards

Jackie was the BBC’s Head of Children’s Acquisitions and Independent Animation from 2015 - delivering programming for 0-16 year olds - until taking up her role at BFI this year. As well as overseeing the strategy for her department, Edwards was responsible for pre-buying and acquiring live action and animated programming. She joined the BBC in 2008 as CBeebies Content Manager and later as Executive Producer, working on programmes including Tree Fu Tom, Octonauts, Bing, Rastamouse and Clangers.

Prior to the BBC, Edwards was a freelancer, working on the development, finance and production of shows for a variety of companies such as LEGO, CBBC, Three Stones Media and Mackinnon & Saunders. She started her television career in animation in 1995 as a production assistant with Hibbert Ralph Entertainment (later Silver Fox Films), going on to produce many prestigious specials and award-winning series.

FOCUS Presents: Young Audiences Content Fund Briefing with Jackie Edwards