Welcoming the Curriculum and Assessment Review
We believe in the power of education – and the role of the education system – to prepare all young people, regardless of background, to have successful and fulfilling futures in life, work and study.
Education should ignite a passion for learning, making sure every young person leaves the system at 18 with the knowledge and skills to make positive choices for a fulfilling life – and the enthusiasm and aptitude to keep learning. The curriculum provides structure for bringing together that love of learning with fundamental knowledge and skills. And the government’s Curriculum and Assessment Review gives us and others in the sector the opportunity to set out how we believe this can be done.
Over the coming weeks and months, we’ll be sharing our points of view in a series of areas, built on the experience, expertise and evidence we’ve gathered over many years, and drawing on the insights and support of the educators, learners and partners we work with day in, day out. You can learn more about these areas in our Curriculum and Assessment Review webspace, which is launching today and will grow as we share more evidence, insights and points of view.
1) A signal of support from the Secretary of State
A clear statement of intent from the Secretary of State for Education highlighting the value of creativity, which could have an immediate positive impact on the subject choices educational institutions and learners make.
2) Creativity recognised in the Ofsted report card
The new Ofsted report card could recognise and highlight a well-balanced and creative curriculum. Giving a signal of likely updates to the language of the Ofsted education inspection framework and the potential for recognising creativity in new report-card-style judgements could be an early driver of behavioural change in schools.
3) Targeted interim content amends
Our work highlights ways in which adjusting the balance of content and assessment in creative and core subjects would have a positive impact on students’ development of creative skills. It also shows how this would help to address some of the challenges of content-heavy curricula more widely. We believe changes here could be implemented quickly as targeted interim amends.
Let’s continue the conversation
We believe that collaboration and conversation across the education community will drive positive change.