Written evidence submitted by Royal Opera House Bridge
Background
1.1. Royal Opera House Bridge (ROHB) is one of ten Bridge organizations funded by Arts Council England to build strong relationships between the cultural sector and the education sector so that children & young people can have access to great arts and cultural learning opportunities. ROHB covers the geographical region of Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Essex, Thurrock, Southend-on-Sea and the North Kent boroughs of Dartford, Gravesham, Swale and Medway. We have worked with almost 1,100 schools in the six years since we were established.
1.2. ROHB is part of the wider Learning & Participation team at the Royal Opera House and is based at High House Production Park, a 14-acre site in Purfleet, Thurrock, a regeneration area within the Thames Gateway. Established in 2010, and jointly funded by Arts Council England, the local authority, statutory bodies and private funders, the Park is also home to the ROH’s Production and Costume Workshops (which include dedicated learning and vocational training facilities), Creative & Cultural Skills’ Backstage Centre, artist studios and restored heritage buildings.
1.3. The evidence presented here to the committee derives directly from ROHB’s work and focusses on two main themes. There is a wealth of additional evidence about the impact that participation in the arts and culture can have on children and young people. Some of this is summarised in the Cultural Learning Alliance’s Imagine Nation reports and more is covered in the Department of Culture, Media and Sport’s CASE programme.
Cross-sector partnerships
2.1. One of the key areas of distinction between arts and sports historically is in the capacity for place-making. Sport has been, on the whole, more successful in driving coordination in local areas. The diminution of funding for local authorities and the concomitant reduction of spending on arts and cultural services in many local authorities has made this situation more challenging still. This, combined with the widespread academisation of schools and the reduction in central school improvement services, has left local authorities less able to effectively co-ordinate a cultural learning offer for children and young people in their areas.
2.2. Partly in response to this change, Arts Council England (ACE) launched the Cultural Education Challenge, a call to arms for better co-ordination between various local agencies and providers of cultural learning. As part of this, ACE set out their aspiration for a national network of locally-led Cultural Education Partnerships.
2.3. Since 2015, ROHB has been actively involved in fostering the development of Local Cultural Education Partnerships across the region (LCEPs). Our work to date has been centred in Colchester, Thurrock, Medway, Luton and Bedford, and we are now working on development further LCEPs in Hertfordshire, Southend-on-Sea, Braintree and Swale. What has quickly emerged from the development of these groups is that there is a lack of existing coordination between cultural providers. However, what has been more heartening is that our work has revealed the diversity of strategic leaders in cultural learning. We have LCEPs, or emerging LCEPs, led by arts venues like arts galleries or museums, but others are being led by schools directly, by local authority school improvement teams and, in one instance, a university. The emergence of these new institutional partners for cultural learning is significant.
2.4. We believe that cross-sector partnerships of this nature have the capacity to improve the provision of cultural learning for children and young people. They are also able to grow the kind of track record that convinces fund holders to invest in their work. Where cultural organizations work in silos without communication it is difficult to identify where young people are being excluded from participation in arts and culture and hard to identify those young people who are being ‘super-served’. The inclusion of different types of institutional partners like HE institutions and school leaders encourages new ways of working that will benefit all parties.
2.5. This approach to cross-sector working continues to inform ROHB’s work. For our Creative Writing through the Arts programme (see below 3.5) we have contracted Northwick Park Primary Academy in Castle Point to act as project managers. They have assigned their Assistant Head to provide project management services, which means that our programme benefits from strong school’s expertise while the school gains expertise in how to lead research across a group of schools and strengthen work with the cultural sector. There is increasing interest in this kind of partnership working and we believe this is worthy of further investigation from policy makers interested in promoting cultural learning.
2.6. Many of the developing leaders in providing cultural learning for children and young people have emerged with the support of initial seed funding from ROHB. For example, ROHB provided initial match funding for Central Bedfordshire Council to undertake a programme of work with vulnerable children in their area. This led to a larger programme - ‘Culture Plus’ - that targets hard to reach young people in Houghton Regis and Dunstable and further work is forthcoming. An entrepreneurial approach to seed funding initial work has been successful in building new ambition for socially inclusive creative and cultural learning.
Teacher Recruitment and Retention
3.1. The challenge of recruitment and retention of teachers has been identified as a key challenge for the education system in England. The School Teacher Review Body’s 2017 Report found that “Teacher retention in England has deteriorated. The overall leaving rate has increased slightly over recent years, but there has been a considerable increase in the share made up by resignations (as opposed to retirements) from the profession. The retention rates of teachers with between two and five years’ service has also decreased”. In 2017, the Education Select Committee conducted an enquiry into the issue, the results of which are summarised here.
3.2. We believe that participation in cultural learning through programmes like Thurrock Trailblazer (3.3) and Creative Writing for the Arts (3.5) has a real contribution to make towards answering the committee’s recommendations Six (“Introducing initiatives to help improve teachers’ job satisfaction may well be a much more cost effective way of improving teacher supply in the long term”) and Fourteen (“All teachers should have the entitlement and opportunity to undertake high-quality, continuing professional development”)
3.3. In 2014, following extensive local research, ROHB co-invested with the Royal Opera House Learning & Participation Thurrock team and Thurrock Council in a cultural entitlement programme, Thurrock Trailblazer. This programme sees schools, the local authority and the Royal Opera House contributing financially to supporting a programme of cultural activities and learning visits that schools can take advantage of. The programme is now in its fourth year and has funding committed until 2020.
3.4. The 2015-16 Evaluation Report for the Thurrock Trailblazer programme, based on qualitative feedback identifies a range of positive outcomes for schools participating in the programme: “Leadership capacity is being built – new career pathways for Cultural Champions” and “Increased morale and job satisfaction – supports performance and retention of teachers.” The evaluation also identifies that “A community of reflective pedagogy” is being established with “potential for long term impact on standards across Thurrock”. The 2016-17 Evaluation Report similarly identifies the role Trailblazer has played in staff development and notes that two thirds of the ‘cultural champions’ within schools had been promoted during the course of the programme.
3.5. In 2014-15, ROHB, with funding from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation (PHF), embarked on a pilot study entitled Creative Writing through the Arts. This programme worked with a Teaching School Alliance in South Essex to provide professional development in a range of creative subjects that teachers could utilise to improve primary school children’s creative writing. ROHB was subsequently able to attract further investment to the programme through PHF’s More and Better Fund for a further three-year programme. The programme is currently being delivered to 45 schools in South Essex. While the pilot programme worked with early career teachers exclusively, the current programme works with teachers at all stages of their careers.
3.6. The Summary Report of the 2015 pilot programme identifies amongst the key outcomes: “Teachers’ positive professional identify was reinforced” and “Teachers were motivated when they saw children inspired, engaged with learning and making better than expected progress in their writing.” The 2016-17 summary report of the current programme similarly identified benefits to teacher motivation. All participating teachers said participation had sparked their own creativity, 10 out of 13 reported increased confidence and 9 out of 13 reported greater enjoyment with teaching in general. Anecdotally, a number of participants who were considering leaving the profession have been inspired to remain.
March 2018