On 12 July seventy representatives from the cultural and education sectors came together at Discover Greenwich to debate the future of cultural education and celebrate 12 best practice Engaging Places projects.
Ian McMillan presents Trinity student with certificate of achivement © CABE
Celebrating success
Madeley Academy’s Stories in stone, developed by teachers in partnership with Wolverhampton Art Gallery and Jefny Ashcroft, was named the winning project. The judges made the following comments:
- "Very innovative – reading the architecture to tell stories about a town’s past. Using the replica models the students built as a set for the film was an excellent way of keeping the story theme going – an extremely engaging approach."
- "Great impact – using a narrative approach to support young people in understanding the value of well-designed spaces was very powerful."
- "I think this project could be very inspirational for other teachers – very replicable, engaging and scalable."
Winning students from Madeley Academy were given a poem written especially for them by Ian McMillan.
Debating the future of cultural education
The debate was led by an expert panel: David Sillito, BBC arts correspondent; Ian McMillan, writer and poet; and Sandra Stancliffe, Director of Education at English Heritage.
Together the panellists and delegates identified six actions they thought would help ensure that young people had opportunities to engage in cultural activity, particularly bearing in mind the current fiscal and policy climate:
- Teacher training
Concentrate efforts on skilling trainee teachers, so they understand how to use their local environment as a teaching resource and how they can best work with local creative experts. Then continue training teachers once they are practicing. - Make use of local resources and expertise
Use local expertise to support creative learning in schools, whether from parents, local community groups, or local organisations such as archives. Arrange school visits to local public buildings and places that are free, and carry out local area studies – within walking distance – that encourage young people to take pride in the unique aspects of their own area. Avoid enforcing a national idea of culture on to individual communities. Take opportunities to hold school events in different locations and to get the local community to visit places they wouldn’t normally use. - Unification of cultural education sector
Enable networking to share best practice and gather research across the entire cultural sector. Present exemplar cultural activity in more interesting ways, as case studies tend to be institutional and boring. - Private sector funding
Explore philanthropy involving the private sector, including the construction industry. Approach local coach companies about rerouting during school hours, so that students can go on school visits at subsidised rates. - Approach cultural activity from new angles
Enable informal built environment education of parents and the community to encourage participation in the improvement of their local environments. Give the community the tools to talk to developers direct rather than going through the local authority. Encourage young people to become creatively involved and give them free reign to think about their perfect places to live and learn. - Graduate placements
Create a paid school placement scheme for new graduates, so they can lend their expertise – whether they studied fine art or economics – to helping teachers design and deliver a more creative curriculum.
Teresa Pearce MP discusses the Erith Marshes project © CABE
The 12 projects developed through the Engaging Places Network are showcased in two exhibitions:
10 July – 14 August 2010
Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Lichfield Street, Wolverhampton, WV1 1DU
Unforgettable lessons is showing in the contemporary room at Wolverhampton Art Gallery.
Details of how to reach the gallery, as well as opening times.
12 July – 31 August 2010
Discover Greenwich, The Pepys Building, King William Walk, London, SE10 9LW
Unforgettable lessons is showing in the mezzanine gallery at Discover Greenwich.
Details of how to reach the gallery, as well as opening times.
