Lord Nash: ...entitlement area, which includes music, art and design, drama, dance and media arts. These are not soft subjects; they combine creativity and practical skills with academic rigour. Our reform of GCSE and A-level exams is designed to ensure that all exams are equally challenging. The noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, and others asked about the role of Ofsted. All...
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch: ...system that gave no priority to arts subjects. While this has now been supplanted by the Progress 8 and Attainment 8 measures, which have slightly more flexibility, the take-up of arts subjects at GCSE is continuing to fall. Meanwhile, the important issue of discounting the value of arts subjects against each other continues to rumble on, with an inevitable negative impact on the take-up...
Lord Bichard: ...become seen as second-class. If it is seen as second-class, teachers and students will walk away from it. They will vote with their feet. We have already had some statistics but it is worrying that GCSE drama students have fallen by 25% in the last six years. Equally, it is important that Ofsted gives due regard to arts education in its inspections and more clearly defines what cultural...
Baroness Nye: ...improve the teaching of drawing and widen the impact of contemporary crafts-based initiatives”. Craft skills generate over £3 billion for the UK economy and it is exceptionally worrying that GCSE craft courses have fallen by a quarter and higher education courses by a half. Will the Minister say whether the department is taking up the Ofsted recommendations and whether he is in favour...
Baroness Kidron: ...teams. In schools, young people learn to work together in drama, sport, dance and film, all of which are disciplines in which a common objective and not just individual attainment is key. In the GCSE drama course, one’s grade actually depends to some degree on the performance and discipline of one’s peers. For our new world, that is indeed a precious lesson. At school, the young learn...
Lord Berkeley of Knighton: ...music, in particular, often gets through where other things fail. Yet, as we have heard, we have to set against that the fact that in the period from 2010 to 2013 there was a drop in the number of GCSE students taking art and, in particular, music and drama, according to the Department for Education’s figures. I wonder whether this is something that causes the Government concern. I very...
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: ...more schools to offer a wider spread of creative subjects with a new accountability framework for secondary schools”. Why, then, have we now had two speeches pointing out the drop in the number of GCSE arts subjects being taken, the very substantial fall in the number of teachers being trained in arts subjects, and the real decline in drama, dance and the graphic arts in our schools? It...
Lord Cashman: ...teacher status. Drama is a distinct art form and should have its own subject status, separate from that of English, in both primary and secondary schools. If drama is to be engaged in before GCSE level, that requires trained and qualified drama teachers in secondary schools, and in primary schools it requires high quality in-service drama training as a minimum. Currently there is a...
the Earl of Clancarty: ...which need to be addressed, this has been true for a while. Since 2003, the number of students taking art and design GCSEs has fallen by 13%, music by 10% and drama by 23%. Overall, the take-up of GCSE arts subjects has fallen by 28%. Then there is the question of the national curriculum itself. It currently makes very little mention of either dance, which is only included in PE, or drama,...