Madam, - I wish to commend your persistence and consistency in highlighting the importance of access to the arts and for pinpointing some of the key issues at the core of this concern. Your Editorial (October 13th) accurately emphasises the school years as the time of optimum opportunity for engagement with the arts. Similarly, schools curricula recognise this and consider the arts as potentially powerful contributions to young people's formation. The revised primary school curriculum in particular envisages the arts as an integral part of children's education and it sets out in detail the kinds of activities and experiences that can be drawn into the classroom from arts disciplines such as drama, dance, music, mime and the visual arts.
This curriculum also articulates the values and enrichments that can accrue to children through engagement with the arts, eg, how the arts may act as a medium of self-discovery and self-expression and assist as an aid in nurturing the child's imagination and creative impulse.
Unfortunately, in classrooms, constraints of time, space, resources, expertise, etc, severely limit a comprehensive delivery of all the arts elements of the curriculum and despite the best efforts of teachers and schools, many, many children lose out.
Opportunities such as these lost in childhood are lost for life as the foundations for later engagement with the arts are left unformed.
Mindful of this and recognising its own educational, cultural and social responsibilities, the City of Dublin VEC has established an "arts in education" subcommittee as part of the implementation of its current education plan. The main function of this subcommittee is to devise a strategy for "arts in education" centres in the city. Working with clusters of schools, these centres will have a number of limited objectives - eg, to support and supplement existing arts activity in schools, to be a resource for teachers involved in creating, developing and delivering arts experiences and projects for their classrooms, to determinedly tackle key deficits in current arts provision particularly in instances where expensive equipment/materials or very specialist expertise is required.
In addition, the centres will be a resource for "community arts" and a focus for local artists working individually or in groups. They will also be places of performance, promoting accessibility and inclusiveness for many artistic and cultural events and experiences.
The City of Dublin VEC, in developing these "arts in education" centres in the city, plans to work in partnership with a wide range of institutions, agencies and individuals.
It is expected that the relevant Government departments will be significant participants and partners in this endeavour.
- Yours, etc,
Cllr MICHAEL CONAGHAN, City Hall, Dublin 2.