GuildHE is an officially recognised representative body for UK Higher Education, championing distinction and diversity in the sector. Our 60+ members include universities, university colleges, further education colleges and specialist institutions, representing over 150,000 students. Member institutions include some major providers in professional subject areas including art, design and media, music and the performing arts; agriculture and food; education; business and law, theology, the built environment; health and sports.
Whilst GuildHE represents Higher Education institutions we take our role in access and participation very seriously. Many of our members work on Boy’s attainment as part of their HE Access and Participation Plans, and/or have identified a gap in engagement from male applicants.
Our dance schools have reported that there is a very clear lack of engagement in dance for boys which will mean a much lower chance of them progressing into the dance profession. Whilst this is worrying for the industry it is also worrying for boys attainment more generally. The 2019 report published by the Social Mobility Commission called An Unequal Playing Field sets out the case that school-aged pupils who engage in extra-curricular activities such as dance, music or sports have a higher rate of remaining in mainstream education, and it also predicts intentions to remain in education after compulsory schooling. Whilst 63% of boys and 41% of girls take part in sports, a far lower proportion of boys (3%) indicated they took part in extracurricular dance compared to girls (23%). Boys are also less likely to take part in community work compared to girls.
The Head of Participation & Outreach at Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Performance Sean Selby, has experience of working with school-aged all-boys dance groups. The dance training the boys took part in helped them in many areas of life such as creative thinking, anger management and with their ADHD symptoms.
In January 2024 the Northern School of Contemporary Dance (NSCD) hosted an event where dance artists across the North came together to discuss some of the most pressing issues facing the sector right now. As part of this event, a session on male-identifying dance was run. It found that much more needs to be done in schools to engage boys in the arts and expose them to the opportunities of dance. Dance is seen to be expensive and exclusionary, and is not well serviced within the curriculum - all of which puts off boys from participating. Furthermore, there is evidence that boys participating in dance suffer bullying at school and lack a strong peer support network. Extra-curricular activities also need more funding to support their outreach work to improve equality of opportunity.
NSCD also run a dance course called Kick Off Boys Youth Dance Project which aims to:
Arts University Bournemouth have been funded to run a project called Being a Boy which provides space for young men to creatively engage with the role of masculinity in their day-to-day lives. Through their website, you can see how the programme offers a supportive environment for boys to talk about all aspects of their lives through the safe space of creative expression.
GuildHE members believe that a potential reason that boys' exclusion rates at school are on the rise is related to the cuts over time in school spending, which has led to a lack of arts provision at state schools. Meaning boys have fewer reasons to be engaged with school. Sport is more often seen to be a gateway to encourage engagement by boys. One of our members UA92 has developed a programme of outreach work that aims to encourage greater participation in education by boys from disadvantaged areas through their pre-HE outreach programmes. As a result, they have a home student intake is more than 70% male with large numbers of them being first in family and from lower quintiles.
May 2024
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