Culture to help the most vulnerable young people gain empowerment: TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation’s new partnerships

Today in France, many young people in vulnerable situations have limited or unequal access to culture and heritage. This is the societal challenge that TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation has decided to tackle, by helping young people gain access to art and culture in all shapes and forms. These actions involve shining the spotlight on rich, diverse and living cultures.

TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation works to ensure access to culture for as many young people as possible, to foster equal opportunities and build a fairer and more sustainable society. To give everyone access to culture, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation supports players across the regions as well as art and cultural education projects which develop young people’s ability to take action and play an active role in society.

As part of its ‘Cultural Dialogue & Heritage’ priority area, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation takes action through three levers:

1. Supporting artistic creativity with a social impact, by and for young people, through art education programs

TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation supports art and cultural education projects that develop young people’s ability to take action. The act of creating helps them develop skills useful for their personal empowerment, socio-professional inclusion, and makes them part of a collective project that contributes to strengthening social ties.

Finally, particular attention is given to art work programs centered on a co-construction and co-creation process, which fosters culture “for all”.

Art work programs promote:

• the acquisition and development of skills essential for social and professional inclusion;
• the empowerment of young people;
• the reinforcement of social cohesion and inclusion.

Particular attention is paid to projects deployed in the regions.

In 2024, the Foundation celebrated its 20-year partnership with the Paris National Opera and Friends of the Paris Opera Association (AROP). OpérApprentis is an art and cultural education program to help young adults in Apprentice Training Centers (CFA) in Île-de-France region and in French Guiana, discover Opera.

In 2024, the Foundation renewed its support to four partners:

• Alhambra Cinémarseille: Backed by TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation, the “Toute la lumière sur les SEGPA” project, which began in Marseille, has been rolled out in several regions throughout France (Occitanie, Hauts-de-France, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Grand Est, Auvergne Rhône-Alpes, Île-de-France and Centre-Val de Loire). It aims to valorize SEGPA (Special educational needs division - intended for children who do not master the knowledge and skills expected on completion of their elementary school education) curriculums and their students through a wide-reaching artistic and cultural project.
• Les Idées Heureuses/Le Concert de la Loge: Created in 2016, the Hip Baroque Choc project offers high-school students studying vocational courses in the Île-de-France and Hauts-de-France regions, to participate in art workshops over a year, and take part in producing of a collective show combining baroque music, hip hop, declamation, percussions, choir singing and applied arts, with professional artists.
• La Source Garouste: La Source Garouste aims to help young people in socially vulnerable situations find fulfillment through access to art and culture. Present in a dozen French departments, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation supports art and digital arts workshops for young people in five regions: Île-de-France, Sud-PACA, Normandie, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.
• Les Concerts de poche: At the heart of the campaigns and districts in the French departments of Seine-et-Marne (77), Essonne (91) and Ardèche (07), Les Concerts de Poche involve young people in socially-difficult situations, the disabled and inmates, in an innovative system of concerts and workshops. The association helps the most vulnerable young people regain their self-confidence and find personal and collective fulfillment through a classical music experience.

TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation firmly believes that creation enables young people to develop skills that are useful for their personal empowerment as well as their socio-professional inclusion, which is why it has decided to continue supporting these art work programs.

Five new partners joined the community of partners in 2024:

• La Sauvegarde de l’Art français: Since the beginning of the 2024 academic year, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation has been supporting the program Les lycéens à la découverte du Plus Grand Musée de France (High-school students discover the biggest museum in France) to raise awareness to, preserve and pass on heritage, led by the Sauvegarde de l’Art français in four French departments: the Côte-d’Or (Bourgogne-Franche-Comté), the Ardennes (Grand Est), the Creuse (Nouvelle-Aquitaine) and the Eure-et-Loir (Centre-Val-de-Loire).
• Labo des Histoires: The Labo des histoires (Story lab) organizes nationwide creative writing workshops to give young people the opportunity to express themselves. The aim is to make writing a form of social, cultural and professional inclusion for teenagers and young adults. “Making young people want to write” is a perfect symbol of the purpose of the partnership between the Labo des Histoires and TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation, where the aim is to develop cycles of long-term writing workshops for young adults supported by social structures in different regions: La Réunion, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Normandie, Sud PACA, Île-de-France, Hauts-de-France and Grand Est.
• Fusion jeunesse: Fusion jeunesse works to stop young people dropping out of school by developing innovative experience-based learning projects that enable young people to “learn by doing”. The cultural digital art and expressive arts program “Jeunes Enchanteurs” backed by TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation, offers 2,000 middle- and high-school students from the Grand Est, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Île-de-France, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Pays de la Loire regions in France, a stimulating and inclusive learning environment, conducive to helping them discover their passions, develop their full potential and become tomorrow’s leaders.
• D.E.F.I Production: Based in Toulouse, the association D.E.F.I. Production aims to foster and develop access to cinematographic culture for adolescents and young adults from priority city districts. With its project “L’oeil et la plume”, every year, 150 to 200 young people take part in creating a  film and discover the world of the film set and the many related jobs.
• Festival d’Aix: TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation supports ‘Passerelles’ the socio-educational program at the Festival d’Aix, with the aim of bringing everyone to the Opera. Every year, hundreds of free workshops adapted to a broad target audience - children and adolescents from associative, educational, health and social structures - are developed with its local partners and led by multidisciplinary artists and educators. These awareness-raising programmes include artistic and creative workshops (choral singing, writing, art and visual arts, theater, dance, etc.), meetings with technical teams, musical events and meetings with the Festival artists.

2. Preserving and promoting heritage buildings, through restoration projects that catalyze professional integration

In terms of heritage, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation contributes to conserving and promoting heritage buildings through restoration work sites, where provisions are made for young people to work as part of a professional integration program.

Each year across France, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation, through its longstanding partner La Fondation du Patrimoine, supports restoration projects with a socio-economic impact that involve young people who are unemployed or unqualified. Heritage restoration projects showcase valuable technical and artistic know-how and offer many professional opportunities. Heritage is an excellent means of inclusion/reintegration and a real lever for employment and training in highly sought-after professions.

The inclusion work sites have three main objectives:

• Help people who have been out of work for a long time or have been excluded from the system to get back to work.
• Back qualifying projects, in which people can obtain certifications or job titles.
• Help people find new motivation in a structured and reassuring framework that enables them to regain their self-confidence as part of a team working for a project.  

In 2024, 16 work sites were supported throughout France, thanks to the partnership with the Fondation du patrimoine:

• Saint-Saturnin narthex in Blois (41)
• Ancient priory of Vernoil-le-Fourrier (49)
• ICP University Campus in Rouen (76)
• Buttresses of the château de Gaillon (27)
• Ancient church of Lapeyrière in Bessens (82)
• Remains of the château de Wildenstein (68)
• Astronomical observatory at the ICP in Rouen (59)
• Chapel of Feuillants in Poitiers (86)    
• Martyrs’ village of Oradour-sur-Glane (87)    
• Chapel of Neuville in Villefranche-d’Allier (03)    
• Entrecasteaux fort in Marseille (13)    
• Sikorsky helicopter in Saint-Michel-en-l’Herm (85)    
• Water tower in Toulouse (31)    
• Château Beauregard in Hérouville-Saint-Clair (14)    
• Royal ravelin at the citadelle de Lille (59)    
• Chartreuse de Neuville (62)

3. Promoting cultural diversity to help people reach out to one another

Making access to culture easier for young people and encouraging open-mindedness when it comes to cultural activities are two of the priorities at TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation. Culture helps broaden horizons, strengthens harmony in diversity and is a source of independence and fulfillment. And because access to culture is one of the mainstays of equal opportunities, TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation encourages initiatives to help young people in vulnerable situations.

TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation therefore supports major projects that foster dialogue between cultures and cultural exchange.

• L’Institut du monde arabe: A 20-year partnership and renewed support for youth, throughout the year, the IMA runs initiatives and projects for educational establishments and young people supported by socio-cultural associations. A wide range of actions that resonate with the commitment of TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation to make culture and heritage vectors of open-mindedness and empowerment for youth.
• The Fondation pour la Mémoire de l’Esclavage (FME): The Fondation pour la Mémoire de l’Esclavage (Foundation for the Remembrance of Slavery) contributes to promoting cultural diversity by promoting the French Republican values of freedom, equality and fraternity, and France’s commitment to fight against racism, discrimination and all modern forms of slavery.

Partners since 2019, the FME and TotalEnergies Corporate Foundation have chosen to focus on projects involving young people aged 12 to 25, whether or not they are in education:

• Speech contest with the écoles de la deuxième chance
• Flamme de l’Égalité contest
• Call for Education projects.