On Thursday Chris, Pat and Jo attended a half day workshop to discuss the emerging Nottingham Cultural Education Partnership. The workshop was convened by the city’s Creative Quarter and held in the Galleries of Justice (pictured above).

The workshop was a response to the Arts Council’s Cultural Education Challenge. The Arts Council  will fund 50 new cultural education partnerships across the country in areas deemed most in need of arts and cultural provision. The initiative follows a pilot scheme that saw cultural education partnerships established in Great Yarmouth, Bristol and Barking and Dagenham. The new partnerships will be initiated by ACE’s network of Bridge organisations – in the East Midlands this is The Mighty Creatives – whose remit is to connect schools, children and young people with arts and cultural activity.

The workshop aimed

• To create a better understanding of Nottingham CEP and what it’s there to do
• To enable partners to understand the current landscape of engagement by children and young people with culture in the city
• To explore and determine a proposed model for the CEP

The workshop was first addressed by Paul Roberts OBE who urged us to consider how the city arts programmes could produce creative citizens. Pat reported on the mapping data that was collected from six key organisations during the Bubble project.

After a series of four provocations the workshop participants discussed the possible plan for a city specific youth programme. Four groups also discussed:

1. Achieving an effective structure for decision-making (especially where multiple partners are involved)

2. Maintaining partners’ commitment and involvement – partnerships need to sustain impetus, provide leadership and direction, respond flexibly to changing needs, and make sure the partnership is achieving its aims;

3. Committing adequate resources – partnerships require sufficient resources to facilitate meetings and other communication, apart from the funding required for specific partnership activities;

4. Gathering data & Demonstrating impact – ultimately, partnerships should be able to provide evidence on the difference they make to their intended beneficiaries.

We look forward to being involved further with the CEP.