Student documentary filmmakers from Roehampton University, London are looking for Polish Nationals who work as professionals in their home country (i.e. vets, doctors, teachers e.t.c.) but who live in the UK (ideally London or Hampshire) and work in unskilled jobs (i.e. cleaners, shop assistants, waiter/ess's e.t.c.) to be used as a focus for a documentary film based on immigration.
If you feel that the above applies to you or anyone that you know and are able to commit a small amount of time to our production due to commence in January then please contact either:
*John Arnold (Director) at arnoldj@roehampton.ac.uk or *Zara Mir (Producer) at mirz@roehampton.ac.uk
I was interested in Polish nationals as they are the biggest immigrating nationals than most countries - according to the BBC, they reside in Britain in as many as 500 per day.
I am however, looking to use most nationalities, ideally one person from an EU country, the other from the rest of the world. And, of course they must be skilled in their home country.
interesting, your statistics are correct,, and indeed it will make a good project, best of luck is the university paying for a trip back to poland.. i heard lublin is a nice place maybe you need a tour guide!
Unfortunately no, the university is to say the least a little stingy with money and a trip is likely to be out of the question.
If you don't mind me asking are you Polish yourself and do you live in the UK. If not, or the documentary subject doesn't apply to you, do you know of anyone that may be interested?
yes mr arnold me from poland east side lublin, not the most developed place, i am living in london and work in finace, have been for around 11 years, just trying to hang on to my polish roots, i have a few friends who meet the criteria i shall inform them.
Thank you very much jareck 8 I really appriciate that. If they are interested, I would very much appriciate if they could email me at arnoldj@roehampton.ac.uk and I will talk with them further.
May I ask why you seem to be focusing on the rather negative stereotype of the poor professional Pole who goes to the UK and is desperate to work in any job cleaning and such like?
If you are making a factual documentary, surely you should also equally tell the success stories of a professional Poles’ coming to the UK, no?
Sorry it just seems a bit stereotypical to me; hope I am proved wrong :O)
Laif or the Polish Express newspapers may be willing to help you as a human interest story.... Or if you're looking for a decent success story, try Magda Harvey of Polish Specialities; she took over the White Eagle Club at Balham (good food in the restaurant as well).
ukpolska: I think that you may have mis-interpreted what I was saying. The documentary intends to look into the reasons why Polish nationals (and others - the documentary focuses on those from outside Europe) arrive in Britain with professional positions and are forced to work in the unskilled sector. I am fully aware that a lot of Poles (and other nationals) come to the UK and are only able to work as kitchen porters and I am unsure why you said 'poor professional Pole[s]' as I had not advertised for this. I appriciate that there are success stories (as there are from Brits moving abroad) but my documentary must very scoped and because of this, I have chosen a question which I would like answered!
Liza: Thank you very much for this advice and Balham is not too far away from my university and so may try that out - thank you...
Hey John, just a thought but if you've not found anyone for your documentary, you could try the Guest Services staff at Chiswick Business Park; come out of the Gunnersbury Tube, and cross the road. Immediately there is a series of about 9-14 modern buildings set around a park including a man made river. The guest services staff all wear grey trousers and bright yellow tops, and by memory a large number of them are Polish (I believe at one stage the employers were providing English lessons as part of the employment perks). Several I spoke to while working there posessed degrees from Polish universities, but were working as cleaners etc while building their language skills.
