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see as it would encourage brains to be worked without feeling like it’s a chore,” a 16-year-old student from Somerset says. “A book and pen aren’t always the best ways to learn for most people. Getting up and doing creative things would engage our minds more.” But, meeting people within the creative industry can also change a child’s perspective of what it means to have a fruitful life, says Bessie Bidder, a felt artist and facilitator at LIFEbeat. “It’s a reminder that there are other things beyond school life and tests,” Bidder says. For students from disadvantaged backgrounds, meeting creative practitioners can also show them that there are career paths beyond well-known avenues such as law and medicine (which can be off-putting for some and incredibly difficult and expensive to get into). The government’s economic estimates for 2019 (link here) showed that, before the pandemic, the creative industries employed 2.1 million people, and in 2018, the sector contributed more than £111 billion to the economy (link here) . Will, a 17-year-old who left his school in London to attend a technical art college – a decision he is happy with – wanted to pursue an art career but was never told it was something he could do, which his school’s approach to learning exacerbated. “In all our subjects, we were reminded of the exam specification in almost every lesson.” An issue he also saw in his creative subjects. “In my art course, we were told to create photorealistic work and pretend to develop towards ideas in order to fall in line with exam specifications.”

and science may seem like the most valuable topics to focus on, and tight budgets can force teachers to want to concentrate on just making sure their students pass, it can be easy to forget the importance of creativity. But, this may hinder a child’s wellbeing and performance in these subjects. “We are facing unprecedented, and ever-increasing, global challenges in many areas”,” says Sicks. “At present, we also have an education system that trains young people out of creative expression and gradually removes creativity from the classroom.” Sicks calls on us all to take action. “Now is a pivotal moment in history. It is a moment where we need to not only process and reflect on our actions, but innovate to solve the world’s problems. Creativity can offer all of this. Right now, we need to be training young people to access their creativity, enabling them to become the next generation of innovators and problem solvers. We need creative leaders. We need creativity in schools.”

This year, LIFEbeat is working with 14 schools in Somerset as part of their Artists in Schools programme. Artists in Schools offers primary and secondary schoolchildren the opportunity to participate in workshops held by people within the creative industry. “Many of our creative activities give young people space to play, express themselves and explore their emotions and feelings through the arts,” Sicks says. “This experience can be transformational.” The project intends to offer children an opportunity to explore their pandemic experience. “All of the lockdown experiences over the pandemic meant children and young people couldn’t

have those social opportunities together,” says Joanne Leek, the

emotional health and wellbeing lead for children and young people at Somerset Public Health, who commissioned the project. “This is social and emotional health learning as opposed to academic learning,” Leek adds. “Offering children something outside of the more academic-led curriculum will support wellbeing, enabling them to continue learning.” Singer and songwriter Jane Taylor, a facilitator for LIFEbeat’s Artists in Schools, agrees. Taylor specifically notes that LIFEbeat approaches wellbeing like a flower, with each petal contributing something different to the plant’s overall health. “So many different things impact our wellbeing, and in this model, one of those petals is our creativity,” Taylor says. Even students recognise that the lack of creativity in classes can affect their education. “More creative approaches in the curriculum would be great to

CREDIT - LIFEBEAT

Precious Adesina is a LIFEbeat youth alumni who is now a journalist, public speaker and radio presenter specialising in arts and culture, lifestyle and social politics. Her work has appeared in BBC Culture, Financial Times, TIME, The Economist, Vice, and more. She has also given talks at Whitechapel Gallery and Nottingham Contemporary on arts writing and research.

In a society where subjects like maths