NAAE advocates for declining creative arts courses
We continue to see creative arts courses being cut across Australian universities and serious revision of arts curricula in some State education departments.
Earlier this month, Southern Cross University announced it would discontinue its courses in art and design, digital media and contemporary music. These cuts affect not only the arts, cultural and creative industries but also the education sector, as they reduce pathways for those aspiring to become secondary arts teachers.
QUT (Queensland University of Technology) has also announced that it is 'pausing' intake to the Bachelor of Creative Arts (Dance) program in 2025 while it conducts a review of the course. We have written to the leadership of both universities, expressing our concerns and requesting they reconsider these decisions.
We are raising these concerns with the Commonwealth Minister for Education, Jason Clare and Commonwealth Minister for the Arts, Tony Burke MP. The Job Ready Graduates scheme, introduced by the previous federal government, urgently needs review, as it continues to disadvantage students in the creative arts and humanities and appears to be directly contributing to declining enrolments in these disciplines.
At the same time, we have written to express our concerns regarding the proposed changes to the Stage 6 Drama, Dance and Music curriculum and assessment by the New South Wales Education Standards Authority (NESA), as presented in the recent draft syllabuses. Our letter to Mr Paul Martin, Chief Executive Officer, (NESA) is here.
In July 2024 NAAE made a submission to the Joint Select Committee on Arts and Music Education and Training in New South Wales, stating that:
The NAAE believes that The Arts, a learning area consisting of five discrete subjects of Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and Visual Arts, should have a central place in the NSW Curriculum in primary and secondary schools in order to realise the recent NSW Curriculum Review’s aims to:
Provide an education that engages and challenges every child and young person in learning, rewards them for effort and promotes high standards; and
Prepare each student with strong foundations of knowledge, capabilities and values to be lifelong learners, and to be flourishing and contributing citizens in a world in which rapid technological advances are contributing to unprecedented economic and social change in unpredictable ways. (NESA, 2020, p. ix).