Goldsmiths celebrates first year of Artsmark partnership

Looking back on a year of delivering the flagship Arts Council England programme.

It’s been a year since Goldsmiths became the national delivery partner for Arts Council England’s Artsmark, a transformative programme that empowers schools to embed arts, culture and creativity across the whole curriculum.

With over 4,000 schools on the programme, Artsmark is the only creative quality standard for education settings in England. As a leader in teacher education, creativity, arts and culture, Goldsmiths has enriched the programme through professional development and support, encouraging schools to become agents of change in their communities.

Over the past 12 months, 900 teachers from more than 600 schools have taken part in Goldsmiths’ bespoke learning programme in sessions across the country and online. At the helm of this initiative is Professor Tara Page, who champions the integration of creativity into learning frameworks, advocating for its essential role in holistic learning, as well as the importance of place in cultural education. 

Since last October, over 60 sessions have been delivered by the Artsmark team of Oliver Herbert, Terri Newman, Henrietta Patience and Esther Sayers – each of whom bring hands-on experience and innovative approaches to the team. The insights from their roles as pedagogues deeply rooted in the arts, and their passion for nurturing creativity and cultural understanding in children and young people, is at the heart of their contributions to the Goldsmiths Artsmark learning programme and embodies a commitment to fostering creativity and cultural education. 

Drawing on the expertise in the wider college, Goldsmiths has also delivered a number of additional learning opportunities for teachers, to broaden understanding and develop classroom practice, and launched the Goldsmiths Artsmark Teachers' Environment (GATE), an online platform for teachers across the Artsmark network to connect and collaborate.