Our Future, Education and Creativity

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OURFUTURE:EDUCA-

TION &CREAT-IVITYThe world is changing rapidly

but is our education system

keeping pace? How do weeducate ourselves in order to

meet the challenges of the

future? And what is the point

of education anyway? Our

government, through cuts in

funding to the humanities and

arts are casting a resounding

vote for traditional STEM

subjects such as science or

maths, promoting them as the

way forward for our culture,politics and economy. Other

voices are saying that for

a successful future we need

to embrace collaboration

and encourage creativity,

or that we must look beyond

established education

institutions.

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Why Schools Kill

Creativity

Sir Ken Robinson

Good morning. How are you? Its been great,hasnt it? Ive been blown away by the wholething. In fact, Im leaving. (Laughter) Therehave been three themes, havent there, runningthrough the conference, which are relevant towhat I want to talk about. One is the extraordi-nary evidence of human creativity in all of thepresentations that weve had and in all of thepeople here. Just the variety of it and the rangeof it. The second is that its put us in a placewhere we have no idea whats going to happen,in terms of the future. No idea how this mayplay out.

I have an interest in education actually,what I find is everybody has an interest ineducation. Dont you? I find this very interest-ing. If youre at a dinner party, and you say youwork in education actually, youre not oftenat dinner parties, frankly, if you work in educa-tion. (Laughter) Youre not asked. And yourenever asked back, curiously. Thats strange tome. But if you are, and you say to somebody,

you know, they say, What do you do? andyou say you work in education, you can seethe blood run from their face. Theyre like,Oh my God, you know, Why me? My onenight out all week. (Laughter) But if you askabout their education, they pin you to the wall.Because its one of those things that goes deepwith people, am I right? Like religion, andmoney and other things. I have a big interestin education, and I think we all do. We havea huge vested interest in it, partly because

its education thats meant to take us into thisfuture that we cant grasp. If you think of it,children starting school this year will be retir-ing in 2065. Nobody has a clue despite allthe expertise thats been on parade for the pastfour days what the world will look like in fiveyears time. And yet were meant to be educat-ing them for it. So the unpredictability, I think,is extraordinary.

And the third part of this is that weve allagreed, nonetheless, on the really extraor-

dinary capacities that children have theircapacities for innovation. I mean, Sirena lastnight was a marvel, wasnt she? Just seeingwhat she could do. And shes exceptional, but Ithink shes not, so to speak, exceptional in the

whole of childhood. What you have there is aperson of extraordinary dedication who founda talent. And my contention is, all kids havetremendous talents. And we squander them,pretty ruthlessly. So I want to talk about educa-tion and I want to talk about creativity. Mycontention is that creativity now is as impor-tant in education as literacy, and we should

treat it with the same status. (Applause) Thankyou. That was it, by the way. Thank you verymuch. (Laughter) So, 15 minutes left. Well, Iwas born ... no. (Laughter)

I heard a great story recently I lovetelling it of a little girl who was in a drawinglesson. She was six and she was at the back,drawing, and the teacher said this little girlhardly ever paid attention, and in this drawinglesson she did. The teacher was fascinated andshe went over to her and she said, What are

you drawing? And the girl said, Im drawinga picture of God. And the teacher said, Butnobody knows what God looks like. And thegirl said, They will in a minute. (Laughter)

When my son was four in England actu-ally he was four everywhere, to be honest.(Laughter) If were being strict about it, wher-ever he went, he was four that year. He was inthe Nativity play. Do you remember the story?No, it was big. It was a big story. Mel Gibsondid the sequel. You may have seen it: NativityII. But James got the part of Joseph, whichwe were thrilled about. We considered thisto be one of the lead parts. We had the placecrammed full of agents in T-shirts: James Rob-inson IS Joseph! (Laughter) He didnt have tospeak, but you know the bit where the threekings come in. They come in bearing gifts, andthey bring gold, frankincense and myrhh. Thisreally happened. We were sitting there and Ithink they just went out of sequence, becausewe talked to the little boy afterward and wesaid, You OK with that? And he said, Yeah,

why? Was that wrong? They just switched,that was it. Anyway, the three boys came in four-year-olds with tea towels on their heads and they put these boxes down, and the firstboy said, I bring you gold. And the secondboy said, I bring you myrhh. And the thirdboy said, Frank sent this. (Laughter)

What these things have in common is thatkids will take a chance. If they dont know,theyll have a go. Am I right? Theyre notfrightened of being wrong. Now, I dont mean

to say that being wrong is the same thing asbeing creative. What we do know is, if yourenot prepared to be wrong, youll never comeup with anything original if youre not pre-pared to be wrong. And by the time they get

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to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity.They have become frightened of being wrong.

And we run our companies like this, by theway. We stigmatize mistakes. And were nowrunning national education systems where mis-takes are the worst thing you can make. Andthe result is that we are educating people out oftheir creative capacities. Picasso once said this

he said that all children are born artists. Theproblem is to remain an artist as we grow up.I believe this passionately, that we dont growinto creativity, we grow out of it. Or rather, weget educated out if it. So why is this?

I lived in Stratford-on-Avon until about fiveyears ago. In fact, we moved from Stratford toLos Angeles. So you can imagine what a seam-less transition that was. (Laughter) Actually, welived in a place called Snitterfield, just outsideStratford, which is where Shakespeares father

was born. Are you struck by a new thought?I was. You dont think of Shakespeare havinga father, do you? Do you? Because you dontthink of Shakespeare being a child, do you?Shakespeare being seven? I never thought ofit. I mean, he was seven at some point. He wasin somebodys English class, wasnt he? Howannoying would that be? (Laughter) Musttry harder. Being sent to bed by his dad, youknow, to Shakespeare, Go to bed, now, toWilliam Shakespeare, and put the pencildown. And stop speaking like that. Its confus-ing everybody. (Laughter)

Anyway, we moved from Stratford to LosAngeles, and I just want to say a word aboutthe transition, actually. My son didnt wantto come. Ive got two kids. Hes 21 now; mydaughters 16. He didnt want to come to Los

Angeles. He loved it, but he had a girlfriend inEngland. This was the love of his life, Sarah.Hed known her for a month. Mind you, theydhad their fourth anniversary, because its a longtime when youre 16. Anyway, he was really

upset on the plane, and he said, Ill never findanother girl like Sarah. And we were ratherpleased about that, frankly, because she wasthe main reason we were leaving the country.(Laughter)

But something strikes you when you moveto America and when you travel around theworld: Every education system on earth hasthe same hierarchy of subjects. Every one.Doesnt matter where you go. Youd think itwould be otherwise, but it isnt. At the top are

mathematics and languages, then the humani-ties, and the bottom are the arts. Everywhereon Earth. And in pretty much every systemtoo, theres a hierarchy within the arts. Art andmusic are normally given a higher status in

schools than drama and dance. There isnt aneducation system on the planet that teachesdance everyday to children the way we teachthem mathematics. Why? Why not? I thinkthis is rather important. I think math is veryimportant, but so is dance. Children dance allthe time if theyre allowed to, we all do. We allhave bodies, dont we? Did I miss a meeting?

(Laughter) Truthfully, what happens is, aschildren grow up, we start to educate themprogressively from the waist up. And then wefocus on their heads. And slightly to one side.

If you were to visit education, as an alien,and say Whats it for, public education? Ithink youd have to conclude if you look atthe output, who really succeeds by this, whodoes everything that they should, who getsall the brownie points, who are the winners I think youd have to conclude the whole

purpose of public education throughout theworld is to produce university professors. Isntit? Theyre the people who come out the top.

And I used to be one, so there. (Laughter) AndI like university professors, but you know, weshouldnt hold them up as the high-water markof all human achievement. Theyre just a formof life, another form of life. But theyre rathercurious, and I say this out of affection for them.Theres something curious about professors inmy experience not all of them, but typically they live in their heads. They live up there,and slightly to one side. Theyre disembodied,you know, in a kind of literal way. They lookupon their body as a form of transport for theirheads, dont they? (Laughter) Its a way ofgetting their head to meetings. If you want realevidence of out-of-body experiences, by theway, get yourself along to a residential confer-ence of senior academics, and pop into thediscotheque on the final night. (Laughter) Andthere you will see it grown men and womenwrithing uncontrollably, off the beat, waiting

until it ends so they can go home and write apaper about it.

Now our education system is predicatedon the idea of academic ability. And theresa reason. The whole system was invented around the world, there were no public systemsof education, really, before the 19th century.They all came into being to meet the needs ofindustrialism. So the hierarchy is rooted ontwo ideas. Number one, that the most usefulsubjects for work are at the top. So you were

probably steered benignly away from things atschool when you were a kid, things you liked,on the grounds that you would never get a jobdoing that. Is that right? Dont do music, yourenot going to be a musician; dont do art, you

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wont be an artist. Benign advice now, pro-foundly mistaken. The whole world is engulfedin a revolution. And the second is academicability, which has really come to dominate ourview of intelligence, because the universitiesdesigned the system in their image. If youthink of it, the whole system of public educa-tion around the world is a protracted process

of university entrance. And the consequenceis that many highly talented, brilliant, creativepeople think theyre not, because the thingthey were good at at school wasnt valued, orwas actually stigmatized. And I think we cantafford to go on that way.

In the next 30 years, according toUNESCO, more people worldwide will begraduating through education than since thebeginning of history. More people, and itsthe combination of all the things weve talked

about technology and its transformationeffect on work, and demography and the hugeexplosion in population. Suddenly, degreesarent worth anything. Isnt that true? WhenI was a student, if you had a degree, you hada job. If you didnt have a job its because youdidnt want one. And I didnt want one, frankly.(Laughter) But now kids with degrees are oftenheading home to carry on playing video games,because you need an MA where the previous

job required a BA, and now you need a PhDfor the other. Its a process of academic infla-tion. And it indicates the whole structure ofeducation is shifting beneath our feet. We needto radically rethink our view of intelligence.

We know three things about intelligence.One, its diverse. We think about the world inall the ways that we experience it. We thinkvisually, we think in sound, we think kinestheti-cally. We think in abstract terms, we think inmovement. Secondly, intelligence is dynamic.If you look at the interactions of a humanbrain, as we heard yesterday from a number

of presentations, intelligence is wonderfullyinteractive. The brain isnt divided into com-partments. In fact, creativity which I defineas the process of having original ideas thathave value more often than not comes aboutthrough the interaction of different disciplinaryways of seeing things.

The brain is intentionally by the way,theres a shaft of nerves that joins the twohalves of the brain called the corpus callo-sum. Its thicker in women. Following off from

Helen yesterday, I think this is probably whywomen are better at multi-tasking. Becauseyou are, arent you? Theres a raft of research,but I know it from my personal life. If mywife is cooking a meal at home which is not

often, thankfully. (Laughter) But you know,shes doing no, shes good at some things but if shes cooking, you know, shes dealingwith people on the phone, shes talking to thekids, shes painting the ceiling, shes doingopen-heart surgery over here. If Im cooking,the door is shut, the kids are out, the phoneson the hook, if she comes in I get annoyed. I

say, Terry, please, Im trying to fry an egg inhere. Give me a break. (Laughter) Actually,you know that old philosophical thing, if atree falls in a forest and nobody hears it, did ithappen? Remember that old chestnut? I sawa great t-shirt really recently which said, If aman speaks his mind in a forest, and no womanhears him, is he still wrong? (Laughter)

And the third thing about intelligence is, itsdistinct. Im doing a new book at the momentcalled Epiphany, which is based on a series

of interviews with people about how theydiscovered their talent. Im fascinated by howpeople got to be there. Its really prompted bya conversation I had with a wonderful womanwho maybe most people have never heard of;shes called Gillian Lynne have you heard ofher? Some have. Shes a choreographer andeverybody knows her work. She did Catsand Phantom of the Opera. Shes wonderful.I used to be on the board of the Royal Balletin England, as you can see. Anyway, Gillianand I had lunch one day and I said, Gillian,howd you get to be a dancer? And she saidit was interesting; when she was at school, shewas really hopeless. And the school, in the30s, wrote to her parents and said, We thinkGillian has a learning disorder. She couldntconcentrate; she was fidgeting. I think nowtheyd say she had ADHD. Wouldnt you? Butthis was the 1930s, and ADHD hadnt beeninvented at this point. It wasnt an availablecondition. (Laughter) People werent awarethey could have that.

Anyway, she went to see this specialist.So, this oak-paneled room, and she was therewith her mother, and she was led and sat onthis chair at the end, and she sat on her handsfor 20 minutes while this man talked to hermother about all the problems Gillian washaving at school. And at the end of it becauseshe was disturbing people; her homework wasalways late; and so on, little kid of eight inthe end, the doctor went and sat next to Gillianand said, Gillian, Ive listened to all these

things that your mothers told me, and I needto speak to her privately. He said, Wait here.Well be back; we wont be very long, and theywent and left her. But as they went out theroom, he turned on the radio that was sitting

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on his desk. And when they got out the room,he said to her mother, Just stand and watchher. And the minute they left the room, shesaid, she was on her feet, moving to the music.

And they watched for a few minutes and heturned to her mother and said, Mrs. Lynne,Gillian isnt sick; shes a dancer. Take her to adance school.

I said, What happened? She said, Shedid. I cant tell you how wonderful it was. Wewalked in this room and it was full of peoplelike me. People who couldnt sit still. Peoplewho had to move to think. Who had to moveto think. They did ballet; they did tap; they did

jazz; they did modern; they did contemporary.She was eventually auditioned for the RoyalBallet School; she became a soloist; she had awonderful career at the Royal Ballet. She even-tually graduated from the Royal Ballet School

and founded her own company the GillianLynne Dance Company met Andrew LloydWeber. Shes been responsible for some of themost successful musical theater productions inhistory; shes given pleasure to millions; andshes a multi-millionaire. Somebody else mighthave put her on medication and told her tocalm down.

Now, I think ... (Applause) What I think itcomes to is this: Al Gore spoke the other nightabout ecology and the revolution that wastriggered by Rachel Carson. I believe our onlyhope for the future is to adopt a new concep-tion of human ecology, one in which we startto reconstitute our conception of the richnessof human capacity. Our education system hasmined our minds in the way that we strip-mine

the earth: for a particular commodity. Andfor the future, it wont serve us. We have torethink the fundamental principles on whichwere educating our children. There was awonderful quote by Jonas Salk, who said, If allthe insects were to disappear from the earth,within 50 years all life on Earth would end. Ifall human beings disappeared from the earth,

within 50 years all forms of life would flourish.And hes right.

What TED celebrates is the gift of thehuman imagination. We have to be careful nowthat we use this gift wisely and that we avertsome of the scenarios that weve talked about.

And the only way well do it is by seeing ourcreative capacities for the richness they are andseeing our children for the hope that they are.

And our task is to educate their whole being, sothey can face this future. By the way we may

not see this future, but they will. And our job isto help them make something of it. Thank youvery much.

This is a transcript from Sir Ken Robinsons

talk at TED in 2006.

http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_

says_schools_kill_creativity.html

Sir Ken Robinson speaking on Why Schools Kill Creativity at TED in 2006

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Department 21

Description

Department 21 is a project where designers,artists and architects can meet, collaborate andshare working space beyond the institutionalboundaries of their own disciplines.

Department 21 was set up in 2009 when agroup of students at the Royal College of Art,London initiated an experimental cross-depart-mental studio space, thereby engendering newdiscussions and ways of working than had beenseen in recent years at the college.

Emerging from an institutional context inwhich individual authorship and outcome-

driven projects are the dominant frames forcreative production, the project is the result ofa need for new, collaborative forms of exchangebetween students from different disciplines: itis a means to get in touch with other peoples

practices (and in this way question ones ownpractice), as well as being a platform to supportcollaboration beyond specialties.

The philosophy driving Department 21 isan emancipated vision of postgraduate stu-dentship, where all those entering a space ofeducation have the responsibility to take aposition regarding their learning process. Con-trary to the commonly found format of shortinterdisciplinary collaboration with a secureoutcome, Department 21 feels it necessary tocreate premises for individuals to encounterthe others spontaneous collaborative workingmethods based on common interests, curios-ity and critical dialogue. The ongoing researchwork of the project is therefore to identify, testand refine methodologies that enable this typeof encounter to emerge and thrive.

SpaceParticular to Department 21 is the emphasison a physical space within which ideas cangrow and serendipitous encounters occur. Witha belief that the physical and social design of

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a learning space has an impact on the learn-ing that happens within it, Department 21 hassought to work with a variety of spaces, bothwithin and outside the Royal College of Art, toencourage different forms of social interactionand dialogue and participation. For each loca-tion the project inhabits (alternatively sharedcommon space, occupancy of the colleges gal-

leries during exhibitions, outdoor events etc.),the question of design comes first.

Recognising the impact that structureshave on how we interact and learn, and usingthe inter-disciplinary knowledge of the group,Department 21 has created a purpose-builtmoveable working space, to enable the activi-ties of learning, teaching and collaboratingto flex to fit a wide variety of spatial environ-ments.

MethodologyOne of the key values of the project is theincidental. Department 21 is not interested inexisting as a closed or heavily-curated project,rather the heterogeneous programming ofevents enable participants and the public to dipinto discussions and actions, therefore privileg-ing the notion of surprise and coincidence. Abalance between clear organisation and chanceis therefore sought, creating fertile groundfor new collaborative working relationships toemerge.

This emphasis on collaborative process andopen exploration is an approach that countersthe institutional agenda of single authorshipand producing industry-ready students. Thisunderlying working method is described in theD21 book, self-published in June 2010 to coin-cide with the Royal College of Arts Show 2010:

Once a physical space is occupied, almostall the participants are involved in activat-ing it. This means inhabiting the space on

a daily basis, keeping possibilities open byre-establishing order after each activity sothat it could welcome the next, taking careof the communication, documenting what isgoing on and supporting those who want toorganise an activity. Crucially, it meant beingsensitive and reactive to the dynamics of thegroup whilst trying not to become a closedsociety.

[D21 publication, page 23]

Whilst the physical format and spatial mani-festation of Department 21 changes frequentlyin response to changing external and internalcontexts, its priorities remain unchanged. It isan independent research platform, valuing the

importance of individual initiative and pre-serving the possibility of failure. Crucially, itacts as a source of peer support, to encouragecritical dialogue and open up the possibilitiesfor new directions in working practice.

Key underlying questions at the heart ofDepartment21 since its inception have been:

How do critical spaces emerge withininstitutions and how do they sustain them-selves?

How can an institution support suchinnovative learning environments?

How do we and should we definepractice and disciplines?

These questions continue to be at the heartof our live research investigation toward thediscovery of potential structures [physical,

temporal, social, organisational] to facilitatecollaborative work.

Activation

As a peer-led pedagogical experiment, Depart-ment 21 only exists if participants are willingto activate it. For each event, space, locationor activity, the diversity of the make-up of thegroup is a key ingredient in enabling seren-dipity, chance and exchange; the experienceis always richer if the range of those involved,whether students, staff, participants, guestor public is as wide as possible. By reachingoutside to new contexts, forming new relation-ships outside the institution, and continuinglines of enquiry, Department 21 hopes tosustain a richness of critical encounter; thatway, Department 21 can play its role of cata-lyst, in whatever context it finds itself.

Collaborators

Department 21 has previously collaboratedwith a number of individuals and organisa-

tions including Critical Practice Chelsea, WillHolder, Richard Wentworth, Antony Hudek,

Alfredo Cramerotti, Ursula Biemann, SophieThomas, Michael Rakowitz, Barbara Steveni(APG), Finn Williams, Roberto Bottazzi,Mauricio Guillen, Manystuff and Carey Young.Some of its events are made possible with thegenerous support of Eurostar.

Text written by Department 21

& Pippa Koszerek

www.department21.net

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Students participating in Department 21 at the Royal College of Art

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The Aims of Higher

Education

Browne Report

A strong higher education program is animportant element in the economy and cultureof a leading nation.

Higher education matters. It helps to creatknowledge, skills and values that underpin acivilised society. Higher education instituions(HEIs) generate and diffuse ideas, safeguardknowledge, catalyse innovation, inspire creativ-ity, enliven culture, stimulate regional econo-mies and strengthen civil society. They bridgethe past and future; the local and the global.

Higher education matters because it trans-forms the lives of individuals. On graduating,graduates are more likely to be employed,more likely to enjoy higher wages and better

job satisfaction, and more likely to find it easierto move from one job to the next. Participat-ing in higher education enables individualsfrom low income backgrounds and then theirfamilies to enter higher status jobs and increasetheir earnings. Graduates enjoy substantialhealth benefits a reduced likelihood of

smoking , and lower incidence of obesity anddepression. They are less likely to be involvedin crime, more likely to be activly engaged withtheir childrens education and more likely to beactive in their communities.

Higher education matters because it drives

innovation and economic transformation.Higher education helps to produce economicgrowth, which in turn contributes to nationalprosperity. OECD countries which expandedtheir higher education sectors more rapidlyfrom the 1960s onwards experienced fastergrowth. Analysis submitted to the review sug-gests that, in the UK between 2000 and 2007,

the increase in employed university gradu-ates accounted for 6% of growth in the privatesector (measured by the extra wages theyearned as a result of being graduates) or 4.2bnof extra output.

Employing graduates creates innovation,enabling firms to identify and make more effec-tive use of knowledge, ideas and technologies.Internationally successful business employhigh levels of graduates, and innovative activeenterprises have roughly twice the share of

employees educated at degree level then thosethat are not active in innovation. These benefitsare captured in the premium employers pay toemploy graduates. A degree provides graduateswith an entry to employment as well as a habitof learning. Over the course of a working lifethe average graduate earns comfortably over100,000 more, in todays valuation and net oftax, than someone with A-Levels who does notgo to university.

Extract from the Browne Report, October

20120: Securing A Sustainable Future For

Higher Education: An Independant Review

of Higher Education and Student Finance.

References Removed

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CHAIRPERSON&

SPEAKERS Teal Triggs, Chair PersonTeal Triggs is Professor of Graphic Design,

Course Director of MA Design Writing

Criticism, and co-Director, Information

Environments, at the London College of

Communication.

Dr Paul Thompson, Speaker

Paul Thompson is the Rector of the RoyalCollege of Art. Prior to 2009, Paul was Director

of the Smithsonians Cooper-Hewitt, National

Design Museum in New York (from 20019),

and Director of the Design Museum in

London (from 19932001). He is a Trustee of

the Victoria and Albert Museum and is on the

Ashmolean Museum Board of Visitors. He is

also a member of the Programme Advisory

Committee of the Wellcome Collection,

Wellcome Trust.

Brave New Alps / BiancaElzenbaumer, SpeakerCollaborating since 2005 under the collective

name Brave New Alps, Bianca Elzenbaumer

and Fabio Franz investigate into the cultural

value of design and its capacity to question

our surrounding realities and to actively

suggest alternatives. In 2009, whilst studying

at the RCA Bianca and Fabio started an

interdisciplinary student-led working space

called Department 21.

Richard Gerver, SpeakerRichard Gerver is one of the worlds foremost

thinkers on education. In 2005, he was judged

the best head teacher in the UK, after turning a

failing school into an innovation success story.

Since then, he has helped governments around

the world to shape education policy and major

organisations to make the most of their talent.

Documents

Our Future, Education and Creativity