Towards a Creative Curriculum

Art is your human right!’ shouted several hundred arts teachers in unison as they responded to Bob and Roberta Smith's reading of his constitution for the arts, a detailed and extensive manifesto that is planning to encourage more arts across schools in the UK. And while this may not sound like the most typical opening for an education conference, it was how the Royal Shakespeare company, the Barbican and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama decided to kick things off at the Barbican for their joint-hosted conference ‘Towards a Creative Curriculum.’

This poignant speech – complete with hand painted signs which bore evocative and moving statements such as ‘Art makes people powerful’ – set the mood for the day. This was not going to be a sleepy conference, where the highlight would be free coffee and biscuits at eleven (although there were those) but one that called to really implement change in the lives of young people across the U.K, through the power of arts education.