campaign

ACA response: tests for four-year-olds in English and Maths

ACA response: tests for four-year-olds in English and Maths

ACA response: tests for four-year-olds in English and Maths

Action for Children's Arts (ACA) notes with concern the statement from Gavin Williamson, Education Secretary on Monday 22nd June that the much-criticised and unproven tests in English and Maths for four year olds are still to go ahead. At a time when all sectors of society - and across the political spectrum - have acknowledged the great threat to mental health and wellbeing caused by Covid-19 isolation, it is vital that our priority as a nation should be meeting the need for stability, sociability and communication. These are key factors that must be in place before young children can learn, and they should be our priorities now. Working together, socialising, creating in small and larger groups; all are vital steps back from the situation in which we now find ourselves. We call for the immediate abandonment of these tests and an urgent re-ordering of priorities to help all our children, especially the youngest, to create, communicate and learn.
Whilst we acknowledge there is now a gap in the English education timescale for Nursery and Primary-school children, we urge that the “knowledge deficit” does not lead to undue pressure upon the children, or the removal of arts and creativity in their school lives in order to “catch-up”. Cramming does not work with this age-range. They will catch up far more quickly if they have the arts and creativity in their lives to provide an escape from mental and emotional strain.
We must be extra careful of our children’s mental and physical well-being. They have never needed the time to create, imagine and play within the school environment more. 
 
Vicky Ireland MBE FRSA
Chair
Action for Children’s Arts

ACA sponsors Freelance TaskForce member

ACA sponsors Freelance TaskForce member

ACA sponsors Freelance TaskForce member

We are proud to have sponsored our Development Officer, Mimi Doulton to become a part of the Freelance TaskForce.

The TaskForce was set up by Fuel Theatre following their Open Letter to Theatre and Performance Makers, which ACA signed. The aim of the TaskForce is to give freelancers paid time to work together in June, July and August, campaigning for government support and positive change in the industry. Over 130 organisations have agreed to sponsor a TaskForce member. Each member will act independently of their sponsor organisation.

We asked Mimi how she felt about joining the TaskForce:

"I am thrilled to be joining the Freelance TaskForce at this time of change in the performing arts industries. I hope that it will galvanise the disparate voices of self-employed theatre professionals across the UK to campaign for better government support at this challenging time. I am also excited to be part of a virtual room full of brilliant minds who can envision a better and fairer future for the industry."

We look forward to following the progress of the TaskForce and will keep ACA members updated!

March Newsletter

March Newsletter

March Newsletter

We had a great time with members, Trustees, Patrons, Critical Friends and other industry professionals at our New Years' Drinks, hosted by SAMA Bankside!

The Arts Backpack UK - February Update

  • Pilots are on schedule to commence in Fife and Leicester from September 2020. We will be working with 7 schools in Fife, in partnership with Youth Music Theatre Scotland; and 4 schools in Leicester, in partnership with Spark Arts.
  • Planning is underway for a London pilot later in the 2020/21 academic year, in partnership with For Good, the charity associated with Wicked.
  • We have received over 200 responses to our children's survey, which was issued via First News in January. Our researchers Keda and Yasemin will be compiling this data to inform their research and evaluation processes.
  • We have received the first instalment of funding from Fife Council.

Chair's report

  • Congratulations to our patron Floella on becoming a Dame!
  • It was with great sadness that we heard of the death of our much loved patron, Terry Jones, an exceptional writer, and a unique creative spirit.
  • Vicky attended the Writer’s Guild GB Awards, and the Writer’s Guild GB Olwen Wymark Theatre Encouragement Awards 2020.
  • A group of TYA Theatre makers attended a meeting with representatives from Action for Children’s Arts, Theatre Education Forum, Theatre for Young Audiences England and Assitej UK with Anne Applebaum, Director of Children and Young People, Arts Council England. You can find full notes of this meeting below.
  • The Government are working hard to support Music Education and are calling for a music consultation. https://consult.education.gov.uk/curriculum-implementation-unit/music-education-call-for-evidence/ Maybe other art forms for children and young people should also strive to make their case heard by Government?

General Election 2019: Manifesto round-up

General Election 2019: Manifesto round-up

General Election 2019: Manifesto round-up

We have done a round-up of  policies on children, education and the arts. Please note that this article has been quoted verbatim from each manifesto, and parties have been ordered according to the number of seats they currently hold in the House of Commons.

The Arts:

  • A £250 million cultural capital programme to support local libraries and regional museums.
  • A Festival of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in 2022.
  • Business rates relief for music venues and cinemas.
  • Maintain support for creative sector and tax relief and free entry to the UK's national museums.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • An 'Arts Premium' for Secondary Schools.
  • An extra £14 billion in funding for schools - that translates to at least £4,000 for each primary school pupil.
  • Raising teacher starting salaries to £30,000.
  • Expand 'alternative provision' schools for children who have been excluded.
  • More school places for children with complex Special Educational Needs.

Children:

  • Invest £500 million in new youth clubs and services.
  • Cement the Opportunity Areas Programme.
  • Review the care system to make sure that children and young adults are being provided with the support they need.
  • A £1 billion fund to help create more high-quality, affordable childcare.
  • Maintain the commitment to free school-meals.

 

The Arts:

  • £1 billion Cultural Capital Fund to transform libraries, museums and galleries across the country.
  • Make the distribution of National Lottery Funding more transparent.
  • Maintain free entry to museums.
  • Launch a Town of Culture competition.
  • Work with trade unions and employers to make creative jobs accessible to all, ensuring diversity in these industries.
  • Ensure libraries are preserved and updated for future generations.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • An Arts Pupil Premium to fund arts education for every primary school child.
  • A £160 million annual boost for schools to ensure creative and arts education is embedded in secondary education.
  • Radically reform early-years education to make high quality early-years education available to every child.
  • Within 5 years, all 2-4 year olds will be entitled to 30 hours free education per week.
  • Maximum class-sizes of 30 for all primary school children.
  • Fund more non-contact time for teachers to prepare and plan.
  • Scrap KS1 and KS2 SATS and baseline assessments, refocussing assessments on supporting pupil progress.
  • Receive advise on integrating private schools into a comprehensive education system.

Children:

  • An £845 million plan for Healthy Young Minds - more than doubling the amount spent on children and adolescent mental health services.
  • Introduce a Future Generations Wellbeing Act.
  • Develop a cross-governmental National Strategy for Childhood, focusing on health, security, well-being and poverty.
  • Stop 300,000 children from being in poverty by scrapping the benefit cap and the two-child limit.

 

The Arts:

  • If Brexit happens, campaign for streamlined visa schemes for artists and performers.
  • Continue supporting tax incentives for Creative Industries.
  • Work towards more equality, inclusion and diversity across the Creative Sector.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • £750 million Scottish Attainment Fund to close the attainment gap in schools.
  • Expand early-learning and childcare provision from 600 hours per year to 1,140 hours.

Children:

  • Expand childcare into the school holidays.
  • Campaigning against the 'Rape Clause'.
  • Introduce a new £10 a week Scottish Child Payment for low-income households by the end of next year.

 

The Arts:

  • Maintain free access to national museums and galleries.
  • Protect sports and arts funding via the National Lottery.
  • Examine the available funding and planning rules for live music venues and the grassroots music sector, protecting venues from further closures.
  • Support growth in the Creative Industries and create Creative Enterprise Zones.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • Protect the availability of arts and creative subjects in the curriculum and act to remove barriers to pupils studying these subjects.
  • Teach the key skills required for children to flourish in the modern world: critical thinking, verbal reasoning and creativity.
  • Reverse cuts to school funding and employ an extra 20,000 teachers.
  • Scrap SATS and replace league tables with a broader set of indicators.
  • Triple the Early Years Pupil Premium to £1000.
  • Require Early-Years staff to complete a training qualification.

Children:

  • Free, high-quality childcare for every child aged 2 to 4 years, and children between 9 and 24 months where their parents or guardians are in work: 35 hours a week, 48 weeks a year.
  • Invest £1 billion a year in Children's Centres.
  • Extend free school-meals to all children in primary education, and children in secondary education whose families are on Universal Credit.

 

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • £16.5 million has already been spent on local schools.

Children:

  • 30 hours for 28 weeks of childcare provision for 3-4 year-olds.

 

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • Financial literacy and oracy to be included in the national curriculum.
  • School health workers introduced in primary and secondary schools.
  • 20-week retraining sabbatical for those in need of a mid-career skills boost.

 

The Arts:

  • Demand a devolution of broadcasting.
  • Maintain free entry to museums and develop a National Digital Library for Wales.
  • Create a new National Gallery for Contemporary Art.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • £300 million extra for schools and colleges.
  • Ensure teachers can make the needs of children and young people central to what they do.
  • Develop a new curriculum, and allow sufficient time and resources for teachers to prepare to teach it.

Children:

  • Universal free childcare 40 hours a week and a new £35/week payment for every child in a low-income family.

 

The Arts:

  • Increase central government funding to councils by £10 billion a year. They can use this funding to nurture arts and culture in their areas, keeping local museums, theatres, libraries and art galleries open and thriving.
  • Reforming copyright and intellectual property rights legislation to ensure a better balance between the rights of consumers and the rights of those working in the creative economy.

Education (for children aged 12 and under):

  • Learning must be lifelong, liberating and accessible to all. Education can and should unlock creativity and enable self-expression across all ages.
  • Restore arts and music education in all state schools.
  • Increase funding by at least £4 billion per year.
  • Long-term aim to reduce class sizes to under 20.
  • Free schools from centrally imposed testing regimes, OFSTED inspections, rigid national curriculum and league tables.
  • Formal education will start at 6 years-old. Those under 6 will remain in early-years education with a focus on play-based learning.
  • Remove charitable status from private schools and charge full VAT on fees.

Children:

  • Ensure that all children receive the basic elements of a good childhood: a decent place to live, safety and security in their community, time and space to play, as well as opportunities to learn and develop inside and outside of school.
  • Prohibit the use of pesticides in the locality of homes, schools and children’s playgrounds.
  • Phase in a Universal Basic Income with supplements for families with children.

 

First donation to the ACA candle campaign

First donation to the ACA candle campaign

First donation to the ACA candle campaign

Our heartfelt thanks to Dr Chris and Hazel Abbott for being the first donors to our candle campaign!

We are asking for donations of £300 to buy a candle on our celebration cake. Alongside your donation you can nominate 10 people for a year's free ACA membership, or you can donate ten bursary memberships to ACA. Each bursary membership will be given to an emerging artist who the Trustees feel would be a valuable part of ACA, but who does not have the funds to become a member.

Click here to become a Candle donor.

Why donate?

We campaign for the right of every child aged 0-12 to access the arts, regardless of their background or personal circumstances. We are particularly passionate about ending inequality in arts education.

A recent report from the Social Mobility Commission found that children from the poorest families are 3 times less likely to be involved in extra-curricular arts activities.

Although we have been running this campaign since 1998, politicians are yet to listen and appreciate the value of instilling creativity in all our children. We need to continue working with teachers, practitioners and arts organisations to democratise arts education.

In the last 18 months our charitable activities have included:

The Arts Backpack UK: In Autumn 2018 we commissioned a Feasibility Study for an Arts Backpack project in the UK. Since publication, we have spoken to over 50 organisations across the four nations, and coordinated a first phase of pilots in Fife and Leicester. Each child will be entitled to at least five quality arts encounters a year.

Networking events: Around 500 people have attended ACA networking events.

The JM Barrie Awards: The 2018 JM Barrie Awards celebrated Stuart and Kadie Kanneh-Mason as role-models to all parents of creative children. In 2019, the JM Barrie Awards honoured Sir Philip Pullman CBE, for a lifetime's achievement in delighting children.

Listening to Children: We are working closely with children from Chickenshed Theatre to develop our research and evaluation structures. Our first piece of child-led research was conducted through schools' newspaper First News in autumn 2019.

We need as big a network as possible in order to push the message home to government that the arts are an important part of all our lives. In these turbulent times, the cultural sector needs to stand together and demand a better future for our children.

Your donation will give us a stronger voice, and enable us to keep making this demand for another twenty years to come.

Click here to become a Candle donor.

September News

September News

September News

What have we been up to...

We have held meetings with the Spark Arts in Leicester, Fife Council, the Jennie Lee Foundation, 11 by 11, the Open College of the Arts, and Wicked.

We have attended WhatNext, the Westminster Forum, the Cultural Campaigning Group and Tom Watson's Creative Industries Federation event.


ACA member Miranda Thain wrote an article about why she is a member of ACA.

The Hullabaloo stands in one of the 1% most deprived wards in the UK, many worlds away from the corridors of Whitehall and yet, through being part of an organisation like Action for Children’s Arts, we feel that we have a voice in influencing the future cultural opportunities of our children nationwide. It may just be a small corner of this confusing world, but together we can make it better.


ACA Chair Vicky Ireland MBE met the minds behind the Norwegian Cultural Rucksack in Oslo.

She also met the new children's laureate Cressida Cowell at the Chiswick Book Festival 2019. We love Cressida's charter for children's reading, which you can take a look at here.

 

News from the industry...

DCMS has published its annual Taking Part Survey, including the Child Report, which can be found here.

The CLA has written a paper on 20 years of Cultural Learning Policy in England. Click here to read it.

The Children's Commissioner has published a manifesto for children, which you can read here.

 

This is only part of the September newsletter. Click here to get the full thing to your inbox every month.

August News

August News

August News

What have we been up to...

We have held meetings with the Spark Arts in Leicester, Fife Council and Sunderland Empire. We are looking forward to meeting the Open College of the Arts, 11 by 11 and Sunderland Empire in September.

We are also looking forward to attending the Creative Industries Federation event with Tom Watson MP and the Cultural Campaigning Group.


ACA Critical Friend Dr Chris Abbott has written a response to the government report An Unequal Playing Field. Read his full response here.


Since Janet's appointment we have been exploring the co-working spaces in London's theatres, galleries and concert halls. Development Officer Mimi Doulton decided to make the most of the opportunity and has created a short guide to some of London's co-working spaces here.


ACA Chair Vicky Ireland MBE and ACA Trustee Chris Jarvis were delighted to meet Emmerson at the Delfont Room, ahead of this year's JM Barrie Awards (pictured at the top of this newsletter). Emmerson is our young presenter for 2019 and will be working alongside Pui Fan Lee.


We are delighted to have welcomed three new members! Writer and illustrator Rod Campbell, creator of the acclaimed Dear Zoo said:

'I am pleased to support ACA in your work in making the arts available to all children as a fundamental part of their development.'

To become a member of ACA, click here.


This is only part of the ACA August newsletter. Click here to get the full thing in your inbox every month!

An Unequal Playing Field – ACA welcomes report commissioned by UK government

An Unequal Playing Field – ACA welcomes report commissioned by UK government

An Unequal Playing Field – ACA welcomes report commissioned by UK government

ACA notes that the Government’s own Social Mobility Commission has joined the chorus of voices raising concerns about children’s access to the arts – in this case especially outside school. The report (www.gov.uk/government/news/extra-curricular-activities-soft-skills-and-social-mobility) notes the huge disparities in children’s participation rates in many different areas.

 

ACA is particularly concerned by the findings of this government report that involvement in the arts, music and dance varies greatly depending upon where children live and their social background, with wealthier families much more likely to be involved in these activities. Most worryingly of all, children from the poorest families are 3 times less likely to be involved in extra-curricular arts activities, found the report’s authors, who were researchers from the University of Bath.

ACA supports the report’s recommendations to the government which include a bursary scheme for disadvantaged families, funding for voluntary sector initiatives, increasing the extra-curricular capacity of schools and the need for further research in this important area. ACA is in a position to assist with the second of these recommendations, and to show the way forward for the involvement of the voluntary sector through the development of its Arts Backpack UK.

In ACA, we believe in each child as an holistic being, with emotional, physical, psychological, aesthetic and intellectual needs and dimensions.

We believe that education should facilitate the realisation of the full potential of each child.

It should not be decided by the financial circumstances of their carers.

Vicky Ireland MBE - Chair, Action for Children's Arts

 

This report contains shocking data about the extent to which access to the arts is related to wealth in the UK. Wealthy children are 3 times as likely to have music lessons, with the difference being even more marked in the south-east of England compared to the north-east. The researchers found that proportionately more girls than boys were involved in music, art and dance – perhaps because of the gendered way in which these activities were offered. It is important to know more about these growing divides and the effect they are having, so we also support the recommendation that more research is needed, especially into ways of meeting this pressing need.

Dr Chris Abbott

Dr Chris Abbott, FRSA
Reader Emeritus in Assistive Technologies, King's College London
Critical Friend, ACA

Chris Jarvis article in Arts Professional

Chris Jarvis article in Arts Professional

Chris Jarvis article in Arts Professional

ACA Trustee and BBC presenter Chris Jarvis has written a fantastic article about the Arts Backpack UK for Arts Professional.

What is profoundly clear from the report is that access to culture is extremely unequal across UK schools. As an organisation we are passionate about targeting those children who do not currently access arts and culture, and hope that the Arts Backpack will be a means of levelling an unequal cultural playing field.

Read the full article here: https://www.artsprofessional.co.uk/magazine/article/arts-backpack

Arts Backpack UK: a statement from David Wood OBE

Arts Backpack UK: a statement from David Wood OBE

David Wood statement

I believe that the Arts Backpack idea could be the most significant notion and possibility to have surfaced in the twenty years or more since our charity began. The idea confirms ACA’s belief that all children are entitled to attend arts events and experiences. This belief is enshrined in Article 31 of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child.

The Arts Back Pack is a novel and appealing way of ensuring that every child can expect to experience the arts several times a year.

The idea is important for children.

It is important for parents.

It is important for teachers.

It is important for children’s arts practitioners and for companies and arts organisations – theatres, museums, concert halls, art galleries etc.

It is important for local councils, and for government. By helping to activate the intentions of Article 31, it is a way of complying with the Article and encouraging interest in the arts.

It is important for the medical profession, who regularly tell us that the arts help children’s wellbeing.

It is important for the Arts Council, who would recognise that attendances at arts events and performances would increase.

It ticks so many boxes!

The Arts Back Pack could revitalise the organisations and companies that provide arts for children, by instantaneously increasing the numbers of children able, via school and/or parent, to take advantage of the offer. In the long term, it would make children’s experience of the arts something that is part of their mainstream education, rather than an add-on or luxury, part of the cake rather than the cherry.

David Wood OBE, ACA President

Click here to find out more about the Arts Backpack UK.