Arts and Technology: Education

(asked on 12th January 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to encourage more take up of (a) creative and (b) technical subjects (i) at and (ii) above key stage three.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 19th January 2023

Cultural education, including music, arts, and creative subjects are integral to a high quality education for all pupils.

Art and design, design and technology, and music are compulsory in all maintained schools from age 5 to age 14. Post 14, all pupils in maintained schools must be offered the opportunity to study at least one subject in the arts. Computing is compulsory for Local Authority maintained schools. Free schools and academies may choose to use the National Curriculum as an exemplar.

The Department will continue to concentrate funding of around £115 million per annum in cultural education over the next three years through the music, arts and heritage programmes. This includes music education hubs, the Music and Dance Scheme, and a set of cultural education programmes such as Art&Design Saturday Clubs, the National Youth Dance Company, and the British Film Institute’s Film Academy programme. The Department published the Model Music Curriculum, which supports teachers in delivering high quality music education.

To encourage computing education and equip pupils to use computational thinking, the Department launched a National Centre for Computing Education (NCCE), backed by over £80 million of funding. This is to improve the quality of computing teaching through continuous professional development and resources. The Key Stage 3 curriculum resources developed by the NCCE include lessons on mobile app development and on how pupils can develop their creativity using information and communication technology.

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