Mapping Creative Education in Leeds to Inform Cultural Strategy Mapping Creative Education in Leeds to Inform Cultural Strategy

Mapping  Creative Education in Leeds to Inform Cultural Strategy Mapping  Creative Education in Leeds to Inform Cultural Strategy

BACKGROUND

Planning for LEEDS 2023 has highlighted a need to understand the current levels of cultural engagement in schools. To address this, a collaborative research project will be delivered in partnership with Leeds City Council, Leeds 2023, Open Innovations and The Audience Agency.   

This project aims to support evidence-based policy making through the creation of a prototype open data resource that maps cultural engagement in schools across the city. We began work in January 2023, and we will be making the open data resources available during June and July of this year.  

During this project, we are engaging with schools and the wider cultural community in several ways:  

  • Facilitated focus groups with Leeds based cultural organisations, exploring how they work with schools. 
  • Sharing a Google Jamboard with cultural organisations who were unable to attend the focus groups to help enable them to share their reflections. 
  • A survey which has been shared with all schools across Leeds. This looks to understand more about how schools engage with the arts and culture, both inside and outside of their curriculum. 

PROJECT INFO

Year

2023 

Collaborators

LEEDS 2023  

Leeds City Council 

Leeds Cultural Education Partnership 

Open Innovations 

The Audience Agency 

University of Leeds 

Funder

Research England 

PROJECT INFO

Year

2023 

Collaborators

LEEDS 2023  

Leeds City Council 

Leeds Cultural Education Partnership 

Open Innovations 

The Audience Agency 

University of Leeds 

Funder

Research England 

BACKGROUND

Planning for LEEDS 2023 has highlighted a need to understand the current levels of cultural engagement in schools. To address this, a collaborative research project will be delivered in partnership with Leeds City Council, Leeds 2023, Open Innovations and The Audience Agency.   

This project aims to support evidence-based policy making through the creation of a prototype open data resource that maps cultural engagement in schools across the city. We began work in January 2023, and we will be making the open data resources available during June and July of this year.  

During this project, we are engaging with schools and the wider cultural community in several ways:  

  • Facilitated focus groups with Leeds based cultural organisations, exploring how they work with schools. 
  • Sharing a Google Jamboard with cultural organisations who were unable to attend the focus groups to help enable them to share their reflections. 
  • A survey which has been shared with all schools across Leeds. This looks to understand more about how schools engage with the arts and culture, both inside and outside of their curriculum. 

OUR TEAM

  • Dr Briony Thomas, Principal Investigator  
  • Dr Jamie Marsden, Co-Investigator 
  • Sylwia Orynek, Research Assistant 
  • Chris Ansell, Co-Investigator 
  • Gaby Paradis, Co-Investigator, Cultural Strategy Lead
  • Sarah Westaway, Co-Investigator, Arts Curriculum Lead 
  • Michelle Brook, Co-Investigator, Delivery Lead 
  • Giles Dring, Co-Investigator, Technical Lead 
  • Penny Mills, Lead Consultant 
  • Carly Henderson, Senior Consultant (Advisor) 
  • Sophia Woodley, Senior Consultant (Desk Research) 
  • Daniel Cowley, Research Manager 
  • Hayley Russell and Miriam Miller, Consultancy Programme Managers

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was supported by Research England under the Policy Support funding stream.