A Child's Right to Participate Fully in Cultural and Artistic Life

Creative and cultural experiences spark the imagination and ambition of children, for both their personal and potentially for their life-long professional goals. The Scottish Government’s Culture Strategy tells us why we need to open up the potential of culture as a transformative opportunity across society, and aims to place culture as a central consideration across all policy areas including education.

The Culture Counts Crowd-Sourced Manifesto, published in advance of the Scottish Parliament Elections in May 2021, calls for investment in a scheme to ensure that all children in Scotland of all ages are assured their right to regular access to a diverse range of cultural experiences.

In new research conducted by Survation on behalf of Culture Counts, we've measured public opinion on our Manifesto Ask. We have captured support for the idea that children should be supported to explore and experiment with a diverse range of free arts, creative and cultural learning.

Our survey sampled 1,010 residents aged 16+ living in Scotland. Fieldwork took place on 4-9 December 2020.

Supporting Children to Explore Creative Learning

Our Survey asked, To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statement? ‘Children should be supported to explore and experiment with a diverse range of free arts, creative and cultural learning either at school or via school?’

85% agree with this statement. In fact, just 2% said they disagreed. You can explore the regional responses to this question below.



Gaining Skills

Our survey also captured an overall sense of attitudes towards creative skills, and drilled down into how your age, or level of educational qualifications attained might impact your outlook.

44% of Scots would like the opportunity to gain more skills across the arts, creativity and culture. However, our interactive chart below demonstrates how much that view can shift with age. The group most likely to want to gain new creative skills is the 25-35 bracket (61%). The most elderly grouping in our survey, those ages 65+ were the least likely (26%). Explore the categories in our interactive chart below.



Qualifications

Our survey also explored how previous qualifications relate to views on gaining new skills across the arts, culture and creativity. We’ve used the SCQF Framework to categorise responses into four groups.



Education

The Culture Counts Crowd-Sourced Manifesto calls for investment in a scheme to ensure that all children in Scotland of all ages are assured their right to regular access to a diverse range of cultural experiences.

Scotland is set to be the first country in the UK to directly incorporate UNCRC (the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child) into domestic law, with the Bill introduced to Parliament in September 2020. The cultural sector applauds this move to strengthen and protect children and young people’s rights in Scotland. The cultural sector applauds this move to strengthen and protect children and young people’s rights in Scotland. Duties under Article 31 include:

  1. States Parties recognise the right of the child to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and the arts.

  2. States Parties shall respect and promote the right of the child to participate fully in cultural and artistic life and shall encourage the provision of appropriate and equal opportunities for cultural, artistic, recreational and leisure activity.

All children should be introduced to a variety of potential hobbies, interests and potential careers. Many cultural hobbies and interests are good for our mental and physical health and children should be able to have knowledge of what the options may be.

Children should be introduced to a diverse range of cultural experiences; for example; dancers, architects, writers and archivists across a range of talks or demonstrations as part of assemblies; full theatrical productions taking place inside or outside of school and participatory experiences expanding the individuals range of expressive skills. See Arts Backpack.

This widens the perceptions and interests that children have and sparks ambitions for the future. For example: (You have to see it to be it) if a working-class child hears a talk from a working-class writer, that child then understands that s/he can be a writer. (You have to see it to be it) works across all protected characteristics; so the more diversity the better.

Furthermore, the Justice sector should seriously consider the power of art (in the broadest possible sense) across all stages of its work. This includes working with at-risk young people, young people in custody, adults in prison, and also people serving community sentences. It has great potential to reach vulnerable individuals, preventing them from entering into the justice system in the first place – this focus could of course be applied in the education sector in conjunction with the justice sector.

Every school should have an annual cultural-plan; agreed in collaboration with the parent council. This enables parents to support head-teachers to bring culture into the school. Schools could submit their cultural plans to the Scottish Government via their local authority to demonstrate their compliance on children’s rights as per the requirements of The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Bill.

You can find more information on the ‘Arts Backpack’ and feasibility studies here: https://www.childrensarts.org.uk/campaign/the-arts-backpack-uk/