The Emporium
will shortly reopen as we start to plan next year’s extravaganza. Though it’s a loose sort of plan, never really
knowing what will happen and what key themes will emerge. At the moment all we know is that it will
happen in June, and we need to keep it dangerous. Please use this forum to
highlight the issues and ideas that matter to you, as this keeps the events
relevant and meaningful.
We
are still working on both the evaluations and creating a virtual tour where you
will be able to access some of the videos and materials that were produced over the two weeks. Already
we have a sense of how important the concept of the Emporium is and some of the
comments are outlined below:
·
The concept captures the imagination,
making you feel empowered, liberated and that anything is possible.
·
Great concept, brilliant to keep
pushing forward with education and to keep encouraging creativity, also great
to offer inspiration and motivation for people working in the sector
·
It gives you ‘permission’ to try
things in a new way, and the guts to talk about things that are often taboo –
it’s unique, refreshing and vital for the sector
·
It’s a much needed concept which
should enable the education sector and beyond to challenge their understanding
of current and planned practice
This is at
the heart of the Emporium; the need to challenge orthodoxy, whether this is in
practice or in policy. However, the
Emporium is only open in June and we need to ensure that this ethos or spirit
exists throughout the year, particularly in light of the national frenzy around
employability and the development of initiatives that will embed the
employability skills into all areas of the school and college curriculum. At the same time we also have a national
agenda for developing the creativity skills of all young people. So we now have to evidence how we are
promoting and embedding the development and value of creative skills within the context of the
employability.
This has an
impact on the professional development (CPD) offered in schools and colleges
and on those who manage it. A concern highlighted in numerous conversations is
that a managerialist and reductionist approach could become prevalent resulting
in a series of limited CPD offerings, with traditional pedagogical approaches
on how to embed creativity and
employability into the curriculum, paradoxically further diminishing the
creativity of teachers/lecturers and the innate creativity and passions of
learners. Much could also be said about
the dominance of a discourse that infers that the reasons young people are not
in employment is due to their lack of ‘employability skills’ rather than
focussing on the economic system, and
the privileging of a curriculum which prioritises
subjects that are deemed to be relevant to the current employment , but that
will be for a future debate.
As someone,
whose raison d’etre is to lead and support professional
development, with a particular focus on creativity I’m been reflecting on my
own learning and development , and what this means for the coming academic year,
and more particularly for the Emporium. Last
week I met up with Paul Gorman from Hidden Giants, ostensibly to reflect on
some of the Emporium events and also consider some changes to another
leadership programme we work on together. As with all good, enriching
conversations we meandered from one subject to another, until Paul told me
about his current interest in micro-breweries. He knew little more than I did
(though he had a book), but was both curious and intrigued by micro-brewers’
ability to create a range of diverse, specialist beers that appealed to an
equally diverse and discerning customer. Perhaps we both just liked the quote from the
book 'I always saw CAMRA (campaign for real
ales) as political, as a radical movement, challenging entrenched and powerful
interests' ( Christopher Hutt,
2013). This
sparked off the most wonderful of conversations about teaching/lecturing
as a micro-brewery activity. It was
fantastical, imaginative and challenging.
It made me reassess all the recent creativity workshops I had delivered,
with a consideration that all I had been offering was a Tennents Special
approach (apologies to Tennents). Was I focusing my teaching on fixed notions of creativity, and whose interests were being served? Could I have supported each individual to develop their own sense of
creativity in how they approached their teaching practice. I could tell you more, but it’s Paul’s idea,
his creativity and his exploration – I’m just nicking a bit.
Conversations
like this are vital, to not only the
development of creativity in learning, but also the personal and professional
development of practitioners. They are
born out of trust, a willingness to be challenged, to take risks, to consider
that we can all learn from one another.
There is a joy in sharing ideas, building on those ideas, watching them
flourish, whilst also knowing they may not actually go anywhere. Even
if Paul doesn't take forward his micro-brewery approach to creative learning,
my ideas have changed, my understanding of my practice has developed and I feel
that I have been part of a creative process.
Was this a nationally, validated and certificated CDP session organised
by my HR department? No. Could the Emporium become a micro-brewery of creative
learning next year? Let me know what you
think, while I nip off to visit Leith’s micro-brewery, all in the name of
research.
