The much touted ‘cultural strategy’ white paper is out.
I'm not impressed. Behind the woolly visions of
regeneration, jobs and social mobility powered by the cultural sector (#themeparkBritain)
is an aching void in terms of serious investment, or interest in the less
tangible, less obviously instrumental benefits of ‘culture’. Everything in this
white paper smacks of a very dizzy, close-to-retirement, nanny running around
with sticking plasters when her charges are expiring from lack of basic care.
Ebacc, Academisation and focus on STEM subjects represent a
concerted campaign to marginalise creative subjects in schools. With
breathtaking, bare-faced hypocrisy the #OurCulture white paper sets out the
government’s expectations thus:
“All state-funded schools must provide a broad and balanced
curriculum that promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical
development of pupils. Experiencing and understanding culture is integral to
education. Knowledge of great works of art, great music, great literature and
great plays, and of their creators, is an important part of every child’s
education. So too is being taught to play a musical instrument, to draw, paint
and make things, to dance and to act. These can all lead to lifelong passions
and can open doors to careers in the cultural and creative sectors and
elsewhere.”
It then bangs on about the national curriculum as if it were
not going to be swept aside in a tidal wave of Academisation and desperate
pursuit of league table success where only STEM subjects count.
A fully rounded education that includes creative
subjects/humanities should be the basis of universal provision, not something
that we have to seek remedies for after the event. Once you lose that universal
provision, no amount of access/inclusivity initiatives will repair the damage.
Beyond the classroom, the white paper appears to throw the entire
responsibility for access/diversity/inclusivity onto Lottery distributors and
the cultural sector – already under immense economic pressure. How is this to
be achieved? and how can it ever be more than a piecemeal response when the
basics are lacking in terms of provision in schools?
Reverse the proposals for making all schools academies and
chuck out the Ebacc. There’s your cultural strategy.
