At a Glance
IN THIS SECTION: Ignite Creativity’s recommendations for action, based on this research
Working from this research, Ignite Creativity has developed the following recommendations.
Breaking down the language used to describe cultural and creative activities.
Placing young people at the heart of decision making and co-production.
Developing ways to overcome access and travel barriers.
Supporting schools and cultural organisations to enhance their cultural activities for young people in Calderdale.
Increasing awareness of and opportunities to progress into creative and cultural careers.
1. Breaking down the language used to describe cultural and creative activities
What are the issues?
Young people’s understanding of creativity is varied but consistent in identifying imagination, expression, ideas and creating things as the key concepts linked with creativity. Definitions of culture, on the other hand, are much broader with traditions, beliefs and religion, nationality and ethnic backgrounds being the determining factors. For many of the young people who took part in the consultation, culture was a generally rigid concept that was linked to their upbringing or religion and was sometimes seen as preventing them from engaging in other cultural or creative activities.
Culture and creativity are two broad concepts, including activities, places we visit, everyday experiences, history and traditions. This broad range of activities means that the definition of cultural activities isn’t always clearly understood by young people. This was similarly echoed by the findings of the Thriving Communities Community Consultation in 2021, where ‘[p]articipants in Central Halifax demonstrated a much broader and different perception of the word culture than those in North Halifax’, where people ‘discussed religion, upbringing, family, and ethnicity’.
Why does this need to be addressed?
Confusion about what culture involves means that young people are not always aware of the true extent of activities that they can get involved in. Discussing creativity rather than culture tends to provide a clearer impression, but young people often have a divided view of culture where it involves either arts and culture or religion and traditions. Key to this is the research and recommendations in the Visualise report, which highlighted the need for increased diversity in the curriculum and extra curricular partnerships with arts organisations. The contrast in participation levels outside of schools is often stark, with young people from an ethnic minority background being 48% less likely to visit cultural sites than those from a white majority background. For the full richness of creative and cultural experiences, we need to support young people and enable them to understand and access the full range of options available to them.
This recommendation aligns with the first priority of Calderdale’s cultural strategy for every person in Calderdale to live ‘a larger creative life’, where ‘every person has culture and creativity woven into the fabric of their lives-whatever their age-to delight and inspire happier, healthier lives’. For this to happen for young people, we need to support them to identify what their fullest cultural and creative life entails.
What actions will Ignite Creativity take?
Ignite Creativity will work to advocate for a larger range of cultural and creative activities. For these to be accessible, the true breadth of activities included in creativity and culture needs to be considered beyond the arts. We will work further to develop a marketing and language toolkit to make cultural activities more accessible for young people and clarify what a creative and cultural activity can be.
It is also clear that more work needs to be done to unite the cultural and religious sectors in Calderdale, so that engaging in cultural activities is not wholly determined by religious affiliations. Many young people told us how their culture was personal to them, but there was also a strong desire to share culture with others. Working across sectors and developing new partnerships will enable a much larger number of young people to take part in cultural and creative activities and will support the development of a language toolkit to aid how organisations can best market to young people across the varied communities in Calderdale.
2. Placing young people at the heart of decision making and co-production
What are the issues?
Most young people get to decide which creative activities they take part in, but their voice in determining the way that these activities take place often is not heard. This is a problem faced nationally, not just in Calderdale, with just 22% of young people believing that their voices were heard by those who run the country. Many organisations told us that they would like to embed youth voice into their decision making but do not feel able to.
LCEPs work to enhance cultural opportunities for young people but there is no ‘one size fits all’ for the best way to co-produce with young people. In Calderdale, the integration of youth voice into the LCEP’s activities has historically been limited: changing this was one of the key motivators for this consultation and report.
Why does this need to be addressed?
We know from previous projects, such as the development of Calderdale’s post 16 strategy, that young people value being a part of decision making. Youth voice is key for ensuring that young people are appropriately represented in the cultural sector, and able to engage with activities that are by and for them. To do this appropriately takes extra resources, which is not always possible for smaller organisations in particular.
This recommendation aligns with the second priority in Calderdale’s Cultural Strategy for ‘creative citizens’ where communities are ‘empowered to grow and sustain their own cultural activity-bringing to life the unique identity of each place and community’. We want to support Calderdale’s young people to be creative citizens. In line with Calderdale’s Post 16 Strategy, we want to support young people with their ambitions: hearing their voice and producing genuine working relationships with young people is key for this.
Prioritising youth voice is similarly essential for the key themes of recognising ‘children as equal stakeholders’ and prioritising ‘meaningful engagement with children’ to influence work, as outlined in the West Yorkshire Child First Framework.
What actions will Ignite Creativity take?
This report acts as the starting point for Ignite Creativity’s work in continuing to research the cultural sector for young people in Calderdale. We will continue to build on this research with larger data sets and for other age groups of young people up to 25.
Our youth steering group will be key to ensuring that young people’s voices are embedded into decision making in Calderdale’s cultural sector and will increasingly work with a larger number of organisations. Additionally, training will be developed and facilitated to support organisations in following the Child First Framework, to ensure that youth voice is both actively embedded and acted on.
3. Developing ways to overcome access and travel barriers
What are the issues?
Young people told us that they face a range of barriers to accessing activities, with issues with travel, time and cost being key. This means that many young people felt restricted to only accessing creative and cultural activities that they could do from their home, often independently rather than being able to connect with others either in person or remotely for these activities. Local initiatives, such as the Culture Map, have shown that young people in many areas of Calderdale are underserved by local cultural activities and resources.
Why does this need to be addressed?
These barriers prevent young people from engaging with cultural activities. Getting to physical locations was a key issue for many young people, whether due to time, money or transport. Similar barriers were identified as part of the Thriving Communities Community Consultation, with time, costs and transport also featuring as key barriers to accessing services and provision. The cost barrier reflects how West Yorkshire features in the highest 20% for childhood poverty and disadvantage. Indeed, developing transport infrastructure has been recognised as key to supporting residents and the growth of Calderdale. Limited access to, and the unreliable nature of, much public transport in Calderdale has also been identified as hindering young people in taking up volunteering and employment opportunities.
Nationally, there are significant inequalities in access to extracurricular activities, due particularly to the barriers of cost and available transport. The identification of these barriers mirrors the Cultural Learning Alliance’s declaration of a national ‘enrichment gap’ running parallel to the ‘attainment gap’, ‘with young people from wealthier backgrounds having much greater access to extra-curricular Arts provision and opportunities compared to their peers from lower-income backgrounds’. Furthermore, research by YouGov for Art Fund in 2023 revealed that a contrast of 52% of students from a lower socio-economic background visited a museum in the past year, in contrast with 70% of those from higher socio-economic background, with 35% of children saying that they haven’t visited a museum in the past year. On both a national and local level, working to overcome these barriers will be essential for increasing access in cultural and creative activities.
What actions will Ignite Creativity take?
Ignite Creativity will work to engage with deliverers of cultural activities to prioritise improving access and develop a toolkit and action plan for ways that we can develop this in a real way to support young people. More research is required to explore the best models for providing access costs for young people as well as ensuring that there is equitable provision of activities across all of Calderdale, including rural areas. This work needs to be undertaken in partnership with the local transport authority, with a unified strategy for across provision and localities.
4. Supporting schools and cultural organisations to enhance their cultural activities for young people in Calderdale
What are the issues?
Adults who work with young people in Calderdale are passionate about supporting and empowering them, but they do not always have the support that they need to do this. Wellbeing was consistently named as a key benefit for young people in engaging with cultural activities, both by the young people themselves and the adults who work with them. Not capitalising on this risks what The Fifth Sector has identified as a key potential for Calderdale as a ‘leader in creative health’.
Working in partnership has consistently been a key part of LCEPs, and this has always been key to Calderdale’s approach. Securing the sustainability of partnerships is essential for further developing provision of cultural activities, with a need to focus on and champion the identity of key places and organisations in Calderdale as well as the people who work there.
Why does this need to be addressed?
Prioritising provision across schools is particularly key at this time, where schools across the United Kingdom are facing significant challenges with budgets struggling with rising costs, a high number of staff shortages, demanding workloads and increased disparities between the most and least disadvantage students that were exacerbated during the Covid-19 pandemic.
These challenges mean that many activities are prevented from taking place, despite the ideas and demands being there. Supporting schools and organisations to deliver cultural and creative activities will be key to increasing access for young people. This is not a problem isolated to Calderdale, where only ‘5% of educators say the education system allows them to support all pupils in the ways that they would like to.’ Teachers need support to be able to develop the activities that they would like to, especially across the areas with pupils from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
What actions will Ignite Creativity take?
Ignite Creativity will continue to connect local schools and organisations, supporting them through network events and Culture Connect meetings. Through further developing this network and providing training activities and events, we will work with the sector to develop a strategy to best support the delivery of cultural activities for young people.
Future research will include exploring the best ways to develop cultural provision both in and out of formal learning in Calderdale. In the shorter term, CPD training that allows teachers to meet with other subject-specific educators will be developed through partnerships with local arts organisations, museums and galleries, in line with national trends and recommendations.
In line with the fourth recommendation in Calderdale’s Cultural Strategy for a ‘distinctly Calderdale’ approach where people ‘are attracted by the vibrancy of the cultural offer, strong sense of identity and creative possibilities’, there will be a focus on developing activities that make use of and promote Calderdale’s strengths as a borough. Provision for young people is already a strong part of activity undertaken by many arts and cultural organisations, and further promoting and developing this will support the development of Calderdale’s cultural identity for all ages.
5. Increasing awareness of and opportunities to progress into creative and cultural careers
What are the issues?
While some young people and their families have a keen understanding of and prioritise creative career pathways, there are many more who have a restricted awareness of available options. Adults who work with young people often do not have the time or resources to support young people in learning more about and pursuing creative careers.
As identified in the recent report into Calderdale’s cultural sector by Fifth Sector, skills mapping and development is an essential challenge that needs to be met. This report also identified that the absence of the provision of a 3 year undergraduate course in a creative subject is a key barrier to developing creative pathways.
Why does this need to be addressed?
Both young people and their parents often have a limited awareness of creative and cultural careers, with no dedicated local resource for them to use in developing this knowledge and opportunities. We know that this is a problem nationally, with young people struggling to access careers advice and recognise the value of their transferable skills, which has also led to significantly high numbers of youth unemployment. The importance of creative skills and employment was recognised by the House of Lords as key ‘to support a diverse talent pipeline for our creative industries, which are a key sector of the UK economy, and the many other businesses that are crying out for creative skills’.
Creativity is one of the key skills in demand by employers in West Yorkshire, but support is needed for young people to develop creative careers and contribute to the high potential of Calderdale as a borough. This recommendation aligns with the fifth recommendation in Calderdale’s Cultural Strategy for ‘a thriving cultural scene’ that ‘is invested in so that it flourishes and plays a unique dynamic and effective role in wider society’. Calderdale is increasingly recognised as having a ‘diverse, globally important and highly creative business base’, which we want to enable young people to take advantage of and further develop. Much attention is currently focused on post 16 careers development and support, but Calderdale’s post 16 strategy has also stressed the importance of prioritising actions for young people aged 13+ to ensure they have ‘core transferable skills’ and ‘secure good employment in line with their aspirations and ambitions’. We need young people to have increased access to skills training and career opportunities to be able to undertake creative careers and contribute effectively to Calderdale as a whole.
What actions will Ignite Creativity take?
Creative careers and pathways can take a variety of forms and Ignite Creativity will work to advocate for this and increase awareness. The first step in this is a Creative Pathways Festival, due to be held in November 2024. Calderdale’s Post-16 Strategy Group is taking steps to develop creative career possibilities in the borough, and Ignite Creativity will continue to work as part of this group to develop a strong network and provision for young people.
A key focus for partnerships will be, as identified by The Fifth Sector, working with Calderdale College’s strategy that ‘prioritises creative skills training’. There is also much potential in the career and skills development by organisations in the voluntary and third sector, which can be capitalised on and supported to grow. Calderdale has a wealth of organisations providing development in creative skills outside of formal learning settings, and supporting this provision to grow will be key to developing access to the wide range of pathways into creative and cultural practices.