ARTS AWARDS


In five years, 25,000 young artists have benefited from the Arts Award national qualification programme. We speak to two teachers about the scheme and two of their students about what it has meant to them


M


ORE THAN 1,000 schools and colleges now offer Arts Award, the national qualification which supports young people to develop creative and leadership skills. Run by the Arts Council


England and Trinity Guildhall, Arts Award is a qualification at Levels 1, 2 and 3 on the National Qualifications Framework (transferring to the Qualifications and Credit Framework in 2010). Some schools offer Arts Award to large groups,


usually at key stage 3, while some focus on students with notable artistic talent, or use Arts Award to recognise extra-curricular commitment. Some schools target students with special needs or challenging behaviour. So what makes this qualification both flexible and popular?We asked two schools to tell us.


Alex Ward, music teacher Notre Dame High School, Sheffield


How do you deliver Arts Award? “In four and half years we’ve taken over a hundred young people through at bronze, silver and gold level. Bronze is offered to year 9s and the silver and gold


Union address: NASUWT A rebalance of power


Billions could be saved with not one job lost,


argues Chris Keates


THE NEW coalition government has published its programme for government. A wide range of measures have already been


announced, including £6.2 billion cuts to public expenditure to be made by March 2011 and a further package of public expenditure cuts to be confirmed in the Autumn 2010 Spending Review and a freeze on the Building Schools for the Future programme. For months in the run up to the General Election,


the parties which now form the coalition government were building up a picture that public services had not only contributed to the recession and economic downturn but were also being given “favourable” treatment compared with the private sector. The public continues to be fed a daily diet of references to “bloated” and “gold-plated” public pensions. The assumption being made by some sections


of the media and some politicians is that at a time of recession deep cuts to public expenditure are inevitable and that the public sector, including education, is so riddled with waste and inefficiency that the cuts will be painless and will spare frontline services. Nothing could be further from the truth. Those who advocate the massive cuts to public


expenditure are seemingly oblivious to the impact of their proposals. A 10 per cent cut in public spending for example could lead to 200,000 job losses. Notwithstanding the enormous hardship for the individual public service worker and the consequent rapid decline in service provision for everyone else, these redundant public service workers would no longer be able to purchase the goods and services of the private sector. It has been estimated that the 10 per cent cut


in public spending would cost the private sector £17 billion in lost revenue with the inevitable impact on jobs and service in that sector. The argument of public versus private is a sterile


one. The success of the national economy depends on the success of both. In reality, however, the vast majority of the


additional funding spent on schools and hospitals over the last decade was to address decades of


serious under-funding in those areas and to address the crisis in staff morale, recruitment and retention the under-funding had caused. The “gold-plated” public service pensions so often


quoted and attacked amount to £5,000 per annum for the average public service worker and around £9,000 per annum for teachers. Hardly “gold-plated”. No-one would seek to diminish the seriousness


of the UK’s financial position but the measures to address it need to be fair and equitable, not based on the concept of “equity of misery”. My advice to the new secretary of state Michael


Gove if he is genuinely serious about saving money while protecting educational standards and the frontline service is to: • Abandon the proposals for new ‘free’ schools. It is completely perverse at a time of economic recession to introduce a programme of new schools which will exacerbate surplus places and have to be funded at the expense of the budgets of existing schools. As many as 96 per cent of the public in a recent Ipsos MORI poll opposed the concept of “free” schools.


• Ditch the reckless and unnecessary invitation to all schools to become academies. This is not only very costly but there is no evidence that academies are better at raising standards than any other schools. Again, 95 per cent of the public in the Ipsos MORI poll did not want charities, universities or the private sector running schools.They want local authorities.


• Review the intention to give schools even more autonomy. For 23,000 schools to all be individual purchasing units for energy, IT equipment, fuel, goods, recruitment, legal, personnel and other services is ludicrous. The lack of economy of scale costs schools and the tax-payer millions in unnecessary expenditure each year.Autonomy is expensive.


• Clawback the over £2 billion currently sitting in some schools’ balances and redistribute it across all schools.


• End the gravy train of private consultants who have leeched off education and other public services for far too long. These measures do of course have a downside. They


protect state education and run counter to a free market philosophy. It’s unlikely, therefore, that this government will find them at all acceptable. Tragic really. Billions could be saved with not one job lost in any school.


• Chris Keates is general secretary of the NASUWT. Visit www.nasuwt.org.uk


Arts achiever: Chloe, a Silver Arts Award achiever from Notre Dame High School, worked on her pointe in ballet for her award. Photo by Porl Medlock


The biggest thing I learned was how unpredictable young children can be and if you stay patient they will eventually work hard for you, especially if you earn their trust and make their lessons enjoyable. Also, I feel my technique improved by doing simpler work, which sounds strange but I was able to think more about my posture and placing.”


Best thing about Arts Award? “Arts Award allowed me to look outside myself and it gave me the confidence to challenge myself. I have learnt to be more confident and to work independently.”


Trevor Evans, performing arts manager Castle Vale School, Birmingham


Describe your delivery model “We introduced Arts Award three years ago to tie in with our performing arts college status and delivery of cross-curricular arts work, funded through our specialist school cluster money. We now offer bronze to all year 7s. Young people


Opening up the arts


awards to the higher years, working in and outside lessons. It’s amazing how word spreads. This year, year 8 pupils have been asking me when they can take Arts Award, due to seeing the success of previous years.”


How do you support students taking part? “I email them with information – what’s going on in Sheffield; meetings to share portfolio work at lunchtime or in my free lessons. We have non-curriculum days when arts trips can support the award.We get together after visits to discuss what we’ve seen.”


What is the impact on young people? “Arts Award students have become more articulate, more confident. They understand that the arts have an integral role to play in society and they’re proud of their achievements.”


How does Arts Award help your school achieve its objectives? “Arts Award helps students develop personalised learning and thinking skills; it encourages working in different arts disciplines (broadening their outlook about the arts) and can act as a springboard to further studies such as BTEC and GCSE.”


What’s your advice to schools thinking about running Arts Award? “Arts Award can be used in so many ways, and you’re never alone because of the regional and national support available. There’s no set timescale like GCSE so you can take your time with the first cohort.”


And your plans for the future? “I’d love to take a whole year group through (with more Arts Awards advisors trained) as many other schools are doing this successfully. Also to build more links within departments such as English and IT.”


Chloe, Silver Arts Award achiever Notre Dame High School


What level Arts Award did you achieve? “My Bronze Arts Award in 2007 and my Silver Award in 2009. I worked on my silver in music lessons and outside school. I’ll beworking towards my gold next year.”


What was your Silver Arts Challenge? “My Arts Challenge was to begin work on my pointe in ballet. I worked alongside my dance teacher in my ballet lessons which I have three times a week until she felt I was confident enough to dance “on pointe” in a dance show.”


Did you find anything difficult? “I struggled with confidence at first and tended to be quite hard on myself if I didn’t pick things up straight away. My dance teacher and my friends at dancing were very supportive and encouraged me to keep trying.”


What was your silver Leadership Project? “To teach dance to younger children aged three to 11.


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do different parts with the drama, music and English departments. The history department leads the “Arts Heroes and Heroines” part – that’s an interesting link. Pupils learn research skills by investigating historical art figures. They can then apply their skills to a modern artist of their choice.”


What attracted you to Arts Award initially? “It’s accessible to everyone and does not rely on students being good academically or even talented in the arts – young people can also take part by doing technical or backstage roles.We want to demonstrate to all pupils that the school has a strong arts ethos from the moment they arrive as year 7s.”


How did you get Arts Award going in your school? “I spoke to the senior management team, and then created a very detailed plan.We had to explain the ethos to other staff. For example, we have a lot of SEN pupils who could still achieve well because they could use other forms of evidence instead of writing.”


And what is the impact? “It has put the arts on the map in school and we’ve seen an increase in participation in arts activities after school.Each year 7 pupil has a portfolio tracking the journey they’ve taken and the skills they gained. Also students who don’t normally engage with the arts are now participating.”


What have been the highlights of running Arts Award? “Supporting a large group through the award – all 130 students achieved awards! For me, the biggest surprise was the enthusiasm shown by the pupils when the moderators came!”


And the challenges? “Supporting all year 7 with only two staff trained as Arts Award advisors was demanding. Next year we’re booking in-house training to train more staff.”


Your plans for the future? “Large group delivery with year 7 again, then look at silver for year 10 alongside GCSEs.”


Taylor, Bronze Arts Award achiever Castle Vale High School


Which arts activities did you explore to achieve your bronze? “I used music, history and we watched a school production and did a review. Music and drama and watching a drama production was all new. It was quite different to primary school.”


Who was your Arts Hero for your project? “Elvis Presley. I found out he came from an ordinary background to become really famous. I thought he had it in his family but they weren’t famous.”


What did you do for your Arts Apprenticeship? “African drumming. We taught other children how to play the drums in a mini-lesson. Other people learned other drums and then taught us those too.”


What’s the best thing about doing Arts Award? “Putting it all together at the end. Seeing all the sections and how much I’d done. I was very proud of it.”


What have you learned? “I’ve learned that you don’t have to be really good at music to get up and give it a go and you can do things like write reviews in the arts and you still achieve.”


What would you say to a young person thinking about doing Arts Award? “Tell them to do it. It’s such a fun experience.”


And your plans for the future? “Either a teacher or a chartered accountant. I’d like to do more Arts Award if I got the chance.”


Further information


Arts Award support for schools can be found at www. artsaward.org.uk/schools. Teachers can also apply to become an Arts Award advisor through one-day training booked online. There is also an Arts Award helpdesk on 020 7820 6178 or enquiries@artsaward.org.uk


SecEd • June 17 2010


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