THE ARTS IN SCHOOLS MATTER!

I have been reading the Cultural Learning Alliance briefing paper on 'The Arts in Schools'... it has a  wonderful introduction by Geoff Barton, General Secretary, Association of School and College Leaders, which every headteacher should read...

"I can’t imagine a truly great school that hasn’t got a vibrant culture of the arts at its core. Drama, music, art, dance: these have long been subjects at the beating heart of the UK’s education system, much envied internationally, much cherished nationally. And now they are under threat.

The arts in schools aren’t just an extra-curricular embellishment. They are where pupils from all backgrounds find new ways of expressing themselves and of understanding the world. The arts are what distinguish human beings from robots. And now is precisely the time when we need to be giving them more, not less, emphasis.

Yet a combination of factors are placing the arts under threat. There’s a general narrowing of the curriculum, driven in too many cases by accountability measures which don’t exactly dismiss arts subjects but do appear to shift them to the less significant margins of a school’s curriculum offer.

And then there’s funding, where – if you’re a head or chair of governors needing to make drastic savings – you’ll do the only thing you can do: cut courses and increase class sizes. That makes arts subjects vulnerable, and ASCL’s survey with the BBC in December 2017 showed bleakly that 90% of school leaders had reduced arts provision in their schools over the past two years.

This matters, because it’s not simply a funding issue: much more significantly, it’s about social mobility.

Many young people come to music or dance or drama or art because of what happens in their school. A teacher spots a spark of talent. They chivvy and nudge and quietly inspire. This matters especially to the child from a background where such activities rarely feature – where classical music, challenging drama, ambitious dance, unorthodox art and design would never otherwise be encountered.

These are the children who most need schools with a commitment to the arts. They need teachers who create opportunities for that heady mix of self-expression, creativity, rigour and self-discipline that come from the creative arts.

These aren’t woolly soft subjects. They are what make us distinctively human. And they should be a birthright for every child from every background. We must make the case for the arts in schools, show that they go way beyond extra-curricular activities, and do all we can to fight to retain them in our classrooms."