ABOUT PLANETE+DOC ACADEMY

PLANETE+ DOC Academy – Education through documentaries

PLANETE+ DOC Academy, realized since 2011, is the first program of education through documentary films implemented in Poland, aimed at middle school, high school and university students.

The program of the PLANETE+ DOC Academy is based entirely on documentaries, which differentiates it from other film education programs. Movies for the program are selected from the rich repertoire of the PLANETE+ DOC FILM FESTIVAL, the biggest documentary film festival in Poland (recipient of the Polish Film Institute award for Most Important International Cinematographic Event in Poland – 2008); covering a broad range of contemporary issues, they are an excellent supplement to general knowledge.

Against Gravity, the organizer of PLANETE+ DOC FILM FESTIVAL, distributor of artistic and documentary movies in Poland, is the initiator and organizer of the project.

More information about the PLANETE+ DOC Academy can be found at the www.akademia.planetedocoff.pl website.

PLANETE+ DOC Academy is a member of the Coalition for Education in the Polish Film Institute.

1. MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOLS
The PLANETE+ DOC Academy project for middle- and highschoolers is designed as an interesting and significant supplement of general education, a unique source of knowledge about history, sociopolitical sciences, artistic and cultural education, and natural sciences. It aims not only to interest students in documentary films as an art form – its goals include teaching young people the skills to interpret the world, stimulating their activity and creative sensitivity, and developing civic consciousness and ability to evaluate social phenomena. The program conforms to the new core curriculum developed by the Ministry of National Education and supplements classes held in middle and high school.

PLANETE+ DOC Academy activities consist of documentary movie screenings followed by a lecture by an educator or a meeting with a special guest. Every documentary also comes with a lesson plan for the teacher.

The program for middle schools consists of 6 movies showing present-day issues from a different, less popular perspective.

The program for high schools consists of 4 programming blocks:
Block 1 – contemporary issues,
Block 2 – art and culture,
Block 3 – psychology,
Block 4 – our planet.

A number of schools participated in the program to date, including the Miguel Cervantes, Jacek Kuroń, Jean Monet, Juliusz Słowacki, Bońkowski, and Maharaja Jam Saheb Digvijay Sinhji High Schools, as well as the Włodzimierz Reytan Middle School, Hugo Kołłątaj Middle School in Błonie, and 120th Middle School in Wesoła.

2. UNIVERSITIES
Academy of Documentary Films PLANETE+ DOC is a general academic course available to tertiary school students. The course consists of weekly movie screenings and lectures given by faculty members.
The Academy of Documentary Films PLANETE+ DOC course was first introduced in the 2012/2013 academic year. This general academic class was created at the University of Warsaw in collaboration with its Faculty of Journalism and Political Science; it became immensely popular among students – over 300 young people signed up for the course.

Starting from the 2013/2014 academic year, the course will be also available at the following schools: University of Białystok (in collaboration with the Białystok Cultural Center), University of Gdańsk (in collaboration with the university's Philology Department and the DKF Miłość Blondynki film society), and – from the summer semester – at the Warsaw and Poznań branches of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, as well as at the University of Wrocław.

The Academy of Documentary Films PLANETE+ DOC program aims at stimulating and directing the interest in documentary films, while providing students with the tools for their critical analysis and use in academic and professional efforts. The syllabus of the course (lectures, screenings, and debates) comprises the most important and most widely debated documentaries of the recent years. Movies featured in the program cover a broad scope of topics – from coming to terms with the most challenging events of the 20th Century (World War 2, the Shoah), through an analysis of contemporary armed conflicts and economic processes (the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, war in Afghanistan, corruption in Asia and Africa, worker exploitation), to intimate group and individual portraits.

The program was created by Paulina Kwiatkowska, PhD, from the Institute of Polish Culture at the University of Warsaw.

Faces of Globalisation PLANETE+ DOC was a program realized as part of the PLANETE+ DOC Academy at the University of Warsaw. It will be continued in the 2013/2014 summer semester as Faces of Propaganda PLANETE+ DOC.