- You're listening to "The Gathering", a podcast for artists and creatives from Arts Lancashire. I'm Alex O'Toole, and this is episode three of series two. This season is all about remaking and remodeling the role and work of artists and creatives in a COVID world, and the practicalities of creating and delivering at a distance. We talk about working within the new restrictions, where the opportunities are, how to rip up the rule book, and why it's more important than ever to ensure that our artistic practice, our places and spaces, and opportunities to make and participate are consistently inclusive and representative. For this episode, I'm joined by Karen O'Neill, Artistic Director at the Dukes Theater in Lancaster; Sara Domville, Cultural Education Manager at Curious Minds; and Nick Horton, the year six teacher at Bowerham Primary School in Lancaster. Our conversation focuses on creative learning opportunities during the pandemic and looks at how we can continue to provide young people with arts-led experiences through a safe, blended approach, to face-to-face participation and distributed learning. We discuss how schools and the arts sector can work together more collaboratively. We highlight the opportunities and challenges for freelance artists working in cultural education, and how both the Dukes and schools want to work with freelancers from here on in. Towards the end of our conversation, Nick leaves to make a call to a parent, but Karen, Sara and I carry on for a while longer, so do stick with us. - Hi, my name's Karen O'Neill, I'm the Director of the Dukes and Lancaster. - I'm Sara Domville, and I'm Cultural Education Manager at Curious Minds. - Hello, I'm Nick Horton and I'm year six teacher and a phase leader at Bowerham Primary School in Lancaster. - Sara, could you just tell us a little bit about what LCEPs are and how they work? - So Curious Minds, we are the bridge organization for the Northwest, and what that means is that part of our role is to connect up schools and cultural organizations to ensure that young people have access to high-quality artistic experiences. And so, the LCEPs are one of the vehicles that we are using to do that. So the LCEPs are all about bringing partners together from across different sectors. Bringing together the cultural sector, arts organizations, museums, libraries, with the education sector. So that's schools, colleges, universities, and alternative education providers as well. We are involving the youth sector, we're involving basic businesses. So basically anybody who works with creativity in young people and the idea behind it is really to encourage people to work better together. So instead of working in silos, we're working cross-sector thinking about how can we reach more young people. So that's a real driver behind this. So, I think it was in 2009, the Arts Council came up with something called the Cultural Education Challenge, which is about ensuring every child and young people has the opportunity to engage in arts and culture. So that's a real driver. It's about looking at who isn't engaging and how can we work together to engage those young people, but also about driving up the quality of the cultural offer for young people. So there are currently 25 of these partnerships across the Northwest and five of those are in Lancashire. So there's one in Lancaster & Morecambe, there's one in Blackpool, there's one in Preston, there's one in Pennine Lancs, and there's one in Burnley with Darwin. - For those who don't know, can you just tell everyone what the acronym LCEPs stands for? - Yes. So, an LCEP is a local cultural education partnership. However, as these partnerships have grown, they've started to come up with their own names. So the LCEP in Lancaster is now called the Culture Co-op and the LCEP in Darwin is called Creative Connections, for example. So as they've gone on, they're coming up with their own personalities and their own sort of brand and identity. - So, prior to lockdown, how were the LCEPs working with schools and independent artists? - So, prior to lockdown, the LCEPs were meeting face-to-face, probably four to six times a year, and then each of the LCEPs came up with a strategic vision and goals. And most of the LCEPs had a model where there were working groups working on different kind of elements. So again, because we're based up in Lancaster, I'm talking to Lancaster people on this podcast, the Lancaster LCEP, for example, had one of its aims was to look at how they could involve young people in the LCEP. Another aim was to map provision that was already happening in Lancaster & Morecambe and to put that together into something that could be shared with schools and parents and young people. And the third strategic aim for Lancaster was around advocating, doing more advocacy to schools. So, that was about convincing schools that arts and creativity should be higher up the priority list. Now, of course, some schools really embrace arts and culture, but for other schools it's less of a priority. - So, a nice lead-in to you, Nick. What sort of things prior to lockdown was your school doing in terms of arts and culture, and were you actually working with and accessing some of the local cultural organizations outside of the school context? - Yes, definitely. We've been involved in a creative partnership with the Dukes for about five years now involving various practitioners visiting the school and working with the children to create tailor-made, if you will, creative outcomes that directly link to the children's experiences in their own lives. And we think that has been absolutely crucial in helping the children use their imagination and be creative in their learning and build that thirst for learning and motivation for learning as well. And we believe in that, very much so here. We've also worked with more music periodically and various other organizations around the district as well. So yeah, it's always been a huge focus for us and something that we want to keep building on in future as well. Of course, since the lockdown, it's kind of been put on hold in that respect in terms of working with outside agencies, but it's definitely something we don't want to lose and definitely is something we want to build on too. - Prior to lock down, was that as part of the curriculum or extracurricular stuff? - Oh, definitely part of the curriculum. We do do extracurricular activities linked to creative subjects, but no, it very much linked to our curriculum and we added that in as integral to the children's learning as opposed to being a bolt-on and use that to work towards some concrete outcomes for the children in their learning. - So, you said then, obviously during lockdown, did it all just completely come to a standstill in terms of work that you were doing with, say, for example, the Dukes? - Yes, well, only in that we were working at a reduced capacity so because we only had the key worker children in and the remit of our existence changed to being care as opposed to education for a while. And obviously outside agencies were all affected as well in terms of their ability to work with other people. But now that we are back up and running, it's definitely something we want to continue to build on. - So, even under the current restrictions, how do you think you'll be able to do that going forward? How are you gonna be able to offer those opportunities to the children as part of their lessons, now in the classroom, but also if we move back into a; say we go into another lockdown, will you still be able to do that, do you think? Are you building that into your plans? - Of course; one of the key elements of our work with the Dukes has been CPD that arises from it and in empowering our staff and giving them the skills to then go and try those techniques and teaching activities themselves. So for the speaking and listening and drama activities that our children have had access to are definitely, I would say, more part of our curriculum now in our everyday cycle of teaching than they were a few years ago, and that was always one of the primary aims. So that's definitely something that we as a school have integrated into our curriculum, but at the same time, we know that there's always room for improvement and we want to keep adding to our repertoire, so to speak. - Do you foresee that being more difficult to do in an online learning scenario? - I think there's always going to be something missing without face-to-face interaction. I think it does make it extremely hard if learning is just going to be online and digital, and I would be really interested to explore any opportunities and avenues through which we could do those sorts of things. I'm really looking forward to getting back, to have those face-to-face links. - Yeah, of course. - And human partnerships. - Have you been using Zoom or Teams or something like that? - Well, we're moving forwards with two online platforms. One is called Showbie and the other being Microsoft Teams. So we're currently in the midst of receiving lots of training regarding both those apps for children who are home learning. In terms of doing arts and creative subjects, well, I think I'd probably need a bit more help . I think a lot of the staff would probably be in the same boat in terms of how could we utilize those things for creative learning and not just for simply uploading work. - Yeah, of course. So there's maybe an opportunity there to do a bit more collaboration with some of the arts organizations or freelance artists, perhaps. So, Karen, in what ways has the lockdown and the new restrictions been an opportunity for the Dukes to reset the way that you engage with schools and with young people? - In lots of ways, the lockdown has been really beneficial to lots of cultural organizations there. It's very easy to get caught on this treadmill. You always go into the next project, to the next year, to the next season, and in a way lockdown has given us that invaluable thing of time to stop and reset in particularly how we engage with children and with young people. And we've done a lot of thinking about that at the Dukes, and I don't think we're all the way there in deciding what we've learned from it. But I think the one thing that we have really taken away from it is that not having the kids in the room with us and not having that access to young people face-to-face has made engaging with them extremely difficult. We started to restart quite a few of our face-to-face activities and, overwhelmingly, the response has been positive because there's just this fatigue among kids, I think, and especially the older young people that we work with of just feeling that there's too much Zoom happening, there's too much online learning and that they really crave that physical space. So I think that's been a big lesson to us in that how valuable that physical space is and how valuable that connection with an artist or with a practitioner really is to the young people. And that we shouldn't really underestimate that, we shouldn't underestimate that value. I think the other thing we've had to learn, and I think we are continuing to learn, like Nick was saying, is how we deliver cultural and creative activity on an online forum that feel valuable, that feels like it's doing something and it's moving things forward. And I think we struggle with that. I think the overwhelming temptation is to just almost give young people a ready-made product, but that's not what we do with them in practice. So why are we doing that with them online? So we've had to really start to think about how do we involve young people in the process of creating an online activity, or how do we create a space where they feel like they can engage to the same level as they would do if they were in the room with us? And that's been really difficult to think about, and to be fair, we've started to lean probably stronger towards film and filmmaking as a way to start to do that, particularly with teenagers and with those, I would say, that are 13 plus. I think we're still looking at all the ways we can engage with younger children, but it is extremely, extremely difficult. - Yeah. - And I think there's a real sense of you're in their territory for a lot of young people. The creative world online is their territory, it's where they come together and make things together and do things together. So I think we've gotta be careful about how much we are treading on their toes and how much we are using them as little experts within the field as much as we are ourselves to make that learning together. And I think that's what we struggle with is engaging with those young people in it, in what feels like a really effective manner. And I have to say some of it we've put down to the fact that I think that the whole period of the COVID lockdown felt very erratic for young people. There wasn't formal school, there was lots of challenges around moving between parental homes, that sort of thing. So I think it's only now that, I think, with them returning to school and there being some level of normal activity back in their lives and normal routine, I think we can engage with them again really effectively. I think we struggled quite a bit during the lockdown, just because I think the young people themselves were in so much personal chaos that it just felt like the wrong time. - Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's quite interesting because it shifts where the power sits a little bit. Because they are so much more experienced in creating content or just making things online; little films, TikTok's massive, isn't it, with all the dance crazes and everything. Is that an opportunity to give them more power to influence what they make, how they make it, who they make it with? - I think it really is. We're doing an experiment at the moment with a film project with young people to make their own films and they can make them however they want, and we've given them a very general theme, which is one that they put forward themselves, which was they wanted this theme of protest. - All right. - And the idea is that they go away and they have some time with an artist who can talk to them about storytelling and planning, they have some time with a filmmaker who can do some technical things with them. But how they make that film is really up to them, and then whatever they bring back towards is what we'll accept as being their piece of creative artwork that they have made. So really trying to say to them, we're not gonna tell you how to make a film on TikTok, 'cause we a 100% understand that you are a 100 times better than that than any of us. But also, you know, they know about editing, they know about all these things already. So it's really just to say to them what we're gonna provide you is some skills from these great people who can do some learning and teaching with you, and then we're gonna provide you a platform. So our commitment back to them is that we'll provide the platform to show those pieces of film that they made so they won't just get lost. They'll actually be shown on the main screen at the Dukes before the films that are scheduled for normal. So the idea is that lots of people will get to see their work, but there will be no judgment about the quality or the content of that work. It will be about the story that they wanna tell in the format that they feel like they want to tell it. And I think that's quite interesting because I think, normally, if we were doing that in person, it might have been a far more controlled - Yes! - experience for the young people, and actually what we've done this time is going, well, let's lose control and see what happens and very much placing it in a place that they're super comfortable in. And the response has been really good. They've been really up for it. We've put certain boundaries around what can be in and what can't be in, but we've also said, look, if it includes things that are on that peripheral, then we need to know about that, we can talk about that, but that we shouldn't be contained by what we think is okay. And that's why we chose this theme of protest where we really wanted them to push their creative boundaries. - So, do you think that sharing on the big screen was a real incentive? Do you think that really incentivized- - Hugely. - Yeah? - Yeah, that was the thing that I think made those young people go, oh, this is really good. And I think the idea that their work was going to be seen publicly and consumed by the public in a way that was quite normalized, I think they quite liked that idea that the idea was that we were putting their film next to established filmmakers and we were putting them together. So I think that feeling of value of what they were doing was really high. I think there was a real concern and worry about the work just going online and then it being lost on YouTube and it not feeling like it's got that presence. I think having that presence of understanding that their work was gonna sit alongside Chris Nolan's, I think for them was really, really big. It's really big and valuable. - Absolutely, I think this idea of creating with a purpose is really important. I think you grow up thinking that being creative is an extracurricular thing or it's something that only some people are good at and not others. But I think if you give it a purpose, if you give it a reason for being, it automatically instills a value within the people who are making it and then also with the people who are eventually watching it or listening to whatever it is. So I think that's really important. - Yeah, I think that's a very interesting point, Alex, because I think that that question of value in the arts is really relevant, and I think the more we instill in young people their creative energy and product and power and what they do with their creativity is of value, whether that is value to themselves, value to their community, value to the society, or has a monetary value, we have to start talking about arts and culture with value attached to it and getting young people to understand that as they grow, there's this real sense that their creativity, however they choose to express it or whatever form it takes, is of a real substantial value to them. And I think it's really interesting if you look, there's questions about what are the skillsets of the future and creativity is number one. - Yeah. - That's the thing that employers of the future, the World Economic Forum is saying is the number one skill that young people will need to have. And we've got to get young people to understand that that is of as much value as their skills in science and in maths and in geography. Their creative skills are just as valuable and that feeling of being able to use it to wield power within their own circumstances was also really important. - It's hugely important. And I think places like the Dukes and others, there's a responsibility there to model what that creativity looks like and how powerful it can be. So, in terms of your work with freelance artists, how has that changed or how has that been impacted by COVID? And are you looking at working with freelancers to support the work that you do with schools? - Yeah, well, I think COVID for freelancers has been exceptionally hard in so many ways. I think for a lot of the freelancers that we regularly work with the complete falling away of all their structures and work practices at the start of the lockdown I think hit them incredibly hard. But it's been an interesting journey with them because quite a number of them have reinvented themselves during lockdown, have taken on new activities, have started to do new things, which has been very interesting for us as an organization because we've been able to go, well, actually, they're doing something that we're quite interested in. How do we work together? I think for us, freelancers are hugely important to the organization. I think they are vital to the work that we do with schools. They're vital to ensuring that the young people that we work with meet a range of different people from different backgrounds and different art forms, doing different things. I think it's really, really important to us that we support the freelance economy in Lancaster & Morecambe. I think we've got some great freelancers and I do worry about the future for the freelancers locally. We know of probably five or six who have already come to us and said, "I can't work with you any more. I'm going into a full time job because I've got to." I think the lack of support for the freelancers has made their lives really hard, and we at the Dukes have made a commitment to support freelancers as much as we possibly can. So we've held back on a number of our strategic plans, particularly around working with young people, around developing with the team to doing more work with the freelancers in the interim, in order to ensure that we are providing employment to that market and supporting that market at what is a very difficult time. And we've worked very hard to get our services back and reopened, so we'll be opening our youth theater, we'll be opening some of our participation programs. We started to work with great schools like Nick's, and to start those programs again as quickly as we possibly can in a COVID safe manner, just to ensure that there isn't that gap for the freelances and for the young people involved. I think going forward, I think it's gonna be really interesting in terms of how the freelance market changes in light of the COVID restrictions; whether we will see more freelancers becoming independent businesses themselves, because that reliance of the security through venues and established organizations has fallen away, so there might not be the confidence in that going forward; or whether we see more freelancers diversifying into other areas. So whether we see more freelances honing digital skills, ready for digital delivery and see what that's like. I think for us as well, I'm very interested now in freelancers who are able to really connect with young people and I think we'll see, probably, I hate to say it, but I think it will be less work, so it will be a case of people will be more fighting for the work. - More competitive. - Yeah, unfortunately. - What about you, Sara? Curious Minds have got the Bubbling Up commissions, haven't you? And that provides opportunities for freelancers to work with young people. - Yeah, just to echo everything Karen's been saying around that really; one of the major concerns for us because we're a sector support organization, has been around freelancers and it's been very clear during lockdown that a lot of them have missed out on the government funding and funding that's been out there to support people. So the first thing we did is we set up something called Bridging the Gap, which we're, so I think we were able to fund over a 100 freelancers from across the Northwest, just with a bit of a stop gap. Because there was this gap when lockdown happened before any funding came online at all for people who were self-employed. And partly why we're so concerned about freelancers is because in terms of cultural education, like Karen was saying, we really rely on freelance artists who can work with young people. And if those artists aren't around and they've gone into other modes of employment, then that's a real issue for the whole of the sector. We also have set up Bubble Up and also some other programs that were all around creating employment for freelancers and small arts organizations at this difficult time. So we've commissioned around 40 freelance artists and small organizations, again, across the Northwest to work together with young people on extracurricular cultural activities at a hyper-local level and in a COVID safe way. So again, like Karen was saying, looking for ways that we can begin that face-to-face delivery in a way that's gonna work for the young people. So some of those young people are working in their year groups, some of those young people are, they're all in bubbles, so this is the thing outside of schools, there's also government guidance on how to deliver extracurricular activities. As part of this, we're also ensuring that freelancers understand what the law is at the moment and how they can move forward their work. - Really important, 'cause it's so confusing, isn't it? - Yeah, absolutely, and one of the other things we've been doing is just is simply bringing freelancers together at different points throughout the lockdown to have conversations, to support each other, and to share practice, because I think there's also been a real feeling of isolation. I think freelancers feel isolated at the best of times because by the very nature of their work, but I think during the lockdown, that's really been enhanced for them. - Absolutely. So do you think, Nick, that what Sarah was just saying there about knowing what to do, what's allowed to be done, do you think that affects teachers as well because you're not quite sure what can be done in terms of arts with groups of children? - I think, maybe perhaps initially there was probably that feeling, I think, and obviously the guidance seems to be updated pretty quickly and a lot. I think things are becoming a bit clearer and I think the confidence is starting to edge back in terms of the ability to do things like this. So I think our take on it is that yes, we want to do these things. Obviously we want to be safe and do things correct, but I think the more we can have access to these skillsets and expertise to influence children's learning in a positive way, it's the better. - Yeah, absolutely. Obviously, in a primary school, it's slightly different, isn't it, because you're much more in directing what they're learning. How easy is it, or would it be, for you to put the children in the driving seat in terms of getting them to tell you what they want to make, what they want to do? - I've gotta say, Nick, I think most seven year-olds are bossier than most 17 year-olds ! - You might be right, yeah! - We're really keen to include the children in how they direct their learning and we place a lot of emphasis on children's voice to shape their learning. Because without that, how can you encourage children to be creative? How can you encourage children to have that real motivation and intrinsic ownership of their learning? I think that's vital to have that. The way we design our curriculum is we take the national curriculum and ensure there's that coverage obviously, but alongside that we have that children's voice. So if they want to take that down a certain path, we do that and we make sure that we can have that to ensure that ownership of learning. And that's at every stage of the planning and the teaching and the delivery and the assessment of it as well. And I think that goes hand in hand with learning creatively and working with these outside agencies as well. - So what sort of things are the children saying to you that they would like to do, like to make, the sort of topics they'd like to cover? Are they going as far as that? I'm trying to think with the online learning stuff as an example? - Well, I think it's different now that we're all back because at the moment, a lot of the focus is on ensuring that the children, that they're settled and they're happy. So in terms of being in school, putting great emphasis on what their needs are as a cohort, as a year group, and making sure that their needs are met in terms of their being able to settle back into school happily and comfortably. So for example, with my year group, that involves being very active and doing a lot of speaking and listening drama activity, so we are making sure that we respond to that and also listen to the children. Where do you wanna take this? What do you want to do? What do you want to achieve with these activities, with this learning? I think going back to when it was actual lockdown, when we only had the key worker children in, and a lot of children were learning from home, we would load choice boards onto to our website for children to be working on at home. - What's a choice board? - It was what we designed. So it would be every fortnight that we'd upload a choice board, activities on it linked to the curriculum. But one of the beauties of all of that was the open nature of it, that children would take that and interpret it and take it their own way and start producing things that you'd think, oh, wow, they're being really creative with this. So the challenge now is to harness that now that we're sort of heading back to normality is to harness that creativity and children's individuality, infusing that back into where we were before. - Yeah, that's a bit like a menu that sounds like, that they can choose what they want to do or choose a particular journey through those activities that feels right to them or plays to their particular strengths or interests. That's something that sounds to me like cultural organizations, freelance artists, could support some of those activities on that board from time to time. - Definitely, definitely. I feel like there's almost a revolution of changes happening in terms of how we're going to interact with our children for specific teaching and learning activities. We're already looking at various resources and outlets that could support children's learning. And obviously, we have a duty to cover the national curriculum, but at the same time can do that in a creative way or allow the children to be creative and also working smartly and not necessarily more. And of course, I think if there are those freelance people like creative organizations out there that can do that and offer that and offer their expertise, then I think schools will snap the hand off to use that and to help support their children in their learning. - And for it to be tied to curricular outcomes. - Ultimately, we have a legal obligation to cover the national curriculum and yes, that's what we will do. And I think a lot is dependent on the direction of the school and also the cohorts of children that they have, but we are keen to address our children's needs as well and take learning where they need it. - Yeah, okay. So Karen, in terms of the older children, you've already said they're fatigued by online interaction and they want to be together in a space in a safe way if that's possible. How are the Dukes thinking about that long term and are you just looking at the footprint of the Dukes or are you looking outside of that? - I think we're definitely looking about how we work with young people in a much more positive way. I think it's interesting, we are starting to look outside the footprint of the Dukes far more, but also we're looking within ourselves far more in that I think a lot of our creative learning and our work with young people has been quite isolated that it's been within that department. And now we're starting to look at the ways that we can engage, particularly with young people across all departments. So are there ways for our other teams of great creative professionals who work in our building able to provide more different and unique experiences for young people? I think what's been interesting for us and what we've become aware of particularly, and I don't know if Nick would agree with this, is that there's a huge amount of support for different types of learning and creative learning from the parents and our guardians. And I think that's because they've been exposed to their kids learning at home. So they've been in that space with them and they've seen how their particular child learns well or where they'd feel most comfortable learning. - That's a benefit isn't it? That's a benefit. - Huge benefit, and I think it's been, we found more support from parents, particularly when we reopened our youth theater offer, parents were really positive about the experience, and we were quite nervous about that. We felt parents would be quite nervous about sending their child back to that sort of environment, and that was not the case at all. They were hugely positive about it and it was almost, it's like a lightbulb moment for some parents, they've kind of gone, "Oh, actually, that's how my child needs to learn, that's what my child needs to develop and grow and I'm gonna be supportive of that now more so than I've ever done before." And I think that's been really interesting for us and I don't know if that's the same experience for you, Nick, in schools that your parents are far more engaged and positive about the way that their kids learn. But I think for us, we are starting to go, how do we branch out and be further out? I think definitely there's a need for us as an organization to be more within the community and work within the community more. I think there's a real sense for us about how do we start to embed particularly practitioners in parts of the community that, on a longer term basis, to start to really solidify some of this stuff that's come from lockdown about how do we enhance and mull this creativity that young people have found, but through working with practitioners? And how do we then provide support to schools in that area and to other young people services particularly? So we started to think about what that looks like for us as an organization. So in a sense, maybe coming far more away from our building, far more out into the community, I think is probably the way forward. - Yeah, it sounds like it. Sara, as Curious Minds, I guess that's part of your remit, isn't it, to facilitate those connections between cultural organizations and the schools. Listening to what Nick and Karen have said there, different way of providing a cultural education than perhaps we might have done so before, because you've got to consider this potential all the time for having to go back to an online learning environment. So how do you think Curious Minds will support that? - It's interesting, really, because I think, like Karen and Nick were saying, that something has changed, obviously, during COVID, and so none of our practice is gonna be the same and we can't go back to how we were working before. And I think that we have, through the cultural education partnerships, we've started to see the benefit of place-based work. Through those partnerships, we've been working in far more of a kind of hyper-local way and made connections across Northwest in new ways. So we've been working far more on the ground, if you like, than we did previously through those partnerships. And I think part of our job is just to continue to support those organizations, to continue to support people, to have conversations cross-sector. I think that's incredibly important, and that, again, is something that's happened during lockdown is the actually the LCEPs have been coming together and sharing intelligence, and artists have been able to say to teachers, so what is going on in schools and teachers have been able to listen to the needs of arts organizations and freelancers, so I think supporting cross-sector conversations. We're really interested in looking at workforce development. So like Karen was saying, what does that look like in the future? What are the roles in the future and how can we support that change? - Workforce development in terms of cultural development of teachers or of freelancers working with schools? - Both. - Okay. - I think we're all changing. I think, like Nick was saying, they've been doing new training. So what does that CPD look like for teachers going forwards? What does CPD look like for freelance artists going forwards and what are the jobs of the future for young people? So what kind of creative work do we need to be doing in schools to skill young people up for those future jobs? So I think all of that is a huge agenda. And then on top of that, of course, you've got the Arts Council's "Let's Create" 2020 strategy, which is all about working far more closely with communities and working in a much more hyper-local way. So I think that's really gonna influence the cultural sector as we go forwards as well. And, as Karen was saying, in a way, those larger organizations can no longer sit back and think about the audience coming to them. People are gonna have to get out there and work much more within communities, I think, in order- - Yeah, that definitely comes across in the Arts Council's strategy. So, in terms of you, Nick, and the school, what's gonna help you stay connected to the professional arts practitioners and venues like the Dukes going forward so that you can continue to offer quite a diverse cultural education to children? - I think at this stage, it's really important to keep up that dialogue and keep up the communication, which we actually have just done these last couple of weeks with the Dukes actually in terms of moving forwards on creative projects. And I think as long as we keep having that conversation and that dialogue, we will work out solutions to these new challenges that we are presented with. I think ultimately, working face-to-face and that having that human interaction would be most beneficial, but I also think alongside that to develop online and digital media partnership would be highly beneficial too. But like I say, for us at the moment, it's about keeping up the dialogue and that conversation to move forward. - So as a freelancer, for example, who wants to continue their work in schools, what would you suggest is the best way for them to continue that dialogue? Is it just a phone call or an email? It's really practical stuff now, but I'm just thinking about lots of freelancers that I know, not just in Lancaster, but around the county. How do they continue to work with schools? - I think making themselves known, speaking to schools, getting in touch with schools, offering their expertise and their skill set and really pushing what they can offer in terms of teaching the children what skills will they learn? How will they allow the children to be creative? What can you offer those skills in those children? And schools are willing to listen, schools are willing to get on board. We're not a closed shop, we're not all heads down, focusing on what we want to do and what we have to do. We want to work with people, we want to work with organizations, 'cause our interest ultimately is the children and their learning. And we all realize that the more expertise that we utilize, the better. - Yeah, absolutely. So it's gonna pay if people can be more proactive about not wait for the call kind of thing, but just sort of get out there and- - Definitely. - And tell people what they can do and how they can do it. So Karen, obviously you're working with schools and you're working with freelancers. What words of encouragement would you give to those responsible for the creative arts offers within schools and the arts sector can help schools think beyond their classrooms? - I think that the thing I would say in terms of encouragement is the desire to work with young people, to work with schools, the absolute passion that the sector has for that, has not been diminished by COVID at all. And if anything, it's probably been more enhanced by the lack of connection that we've had with those communities, with schools and those young people. So I think that passion and that desire to work collaboratively is there. The thing I would say, just to reiterate that point with freelancers as well, is that I think we have to recognize that a lot of arts organizations, due to the impact of COVID, have had to reduce their teams, we've had to reduce our capacity to do things, and the things that we would normally do that we could do in the blink of an eye, now take us a lot longer and require more staff. So, I think the opportunity is there for a lot of freelancers and for a lot of schools to work in really great partnerships with arts organizations. From my point of view, as someone within a creative organization, I would love a freelancer to come through my door and go, "I've got a great idea for a school project and I think I could work with you to make it happen." They're the type of conversations that we wanna have and I wanna have these conversations with schools as well. I think it's really interesting listening to Nick talk about how the curriculum and creating these opportunities within the school environment for the schools to come to us in a way and kind of go, "These are our challenges and these are what we need at the end of it," and then it's our job as creative organizations to find a way to facilitate that with the schools. So the thing that I would put out to everyone is that we should see this moment as a moment of opportunity for change of how we work together. So how do freelancers and organizations work together better? How do organizations and schools work together better? Because this is our chance to rewrite a lot of the rules and it's our chance to go, "Well, actually we've had to change who we are, so why don't we change the way we interact with the people around us?" And I think particularly for the Dukes, we're all about partnerships now, we're all about collaboration, we're all about how do we understand where we fit sometimes? And I think that old model of arts organizations going to schools with their packaged product, going, "This is what we'll deliver to you" and the school saying yes or no, I think that's gone now. - Yeah, I do. - I think it has to be a really strong collaboration between those two parties coming together to get the best results. And I think for freelancers, it's a real chance to start knocking down the doors a little bit and asking these creative organizations "What projects have they got on? How can I be a part of it? These are the skills that I have." And I think it's interesting for the Dukes, we did a big callout for freelancers in the middle of the lockdown, which, I think for most people was like, why are they calling out for freelancers? But we knew we had all these projects coming and we knew we wanted to pick up all this work, and we're very aware that sometimes we're not the right person to be in the room delivering it, but we are the right facilitator to make that moment happen. And I think that's what we've gotta encourage everyone to do, is to start to think about doing things far more collaboratively, and I would love schools to come to us and go, "This is what we need to happen," and give us the challenge of trying to make that happen for them. That would be really exciting for us. - I think you're right. The great thing about collaboration is it's not about asking permission. And I think partly because of the way the sector is funded and partly because we're all, all of us on all sides of it are short of time all the time, we seem to think that we need to ask for permission to do something, or we need to ask for permission for someone to get involved. And actually, if we all just said what we're interested in, said what we wanted to do, said what we needed to do, it'd be much more of a balanced conversation, and those opportunities would naturally bubble up to a take on Curious Minds' phrase. But it's true, it's about having more of those conversations and being more connected in having those conversations. So thank you so much for that conversation. There's so much that we could talk about, but I really appreciate you taking time out of your day and particularly you, Nick, at the end of your very busy day as well. - Thank you, no, it's been brilliant. - You're back on the radar now, Nick. - Yeah, that's it, you're not getting off now. You'll have every arts organization in Lancashire calling you. - Great. - That was just really enjoyable and really informative and lovely to hear from you, Karen, and from Nick, about what's going on. I don't think that we can have enough of these conversations at the moment, basically. So important that we're all talking and sharing. - Yeah, definitely. And I think what's really interesting is, for me, is that they need more choice, they need more ideas, don't they? They're having to struggle with so many different ways of working and delivering what they normally deliver in a classroom environment. They just need people to help them. - I think it goes back to that thing about freelancers again and organizations. It's like, who is the right person in the room to deliver that? We need to find the right freelancers that we can work with on a good, regular basis. And also acknowledge that, for a lot of those teachers, the pressure is huge and they're teaching, especially primary school, they're teaching a range of subjects. It's our job to come into that space and give them what we know and our expertise and our knowledge for the right results. And I think that's what we've got to get better at as a set sector is being able to step back and let them pushing someone else forward. - Exactly, it sounds ridiculous, but in any other sort of service business or service sector, you would look at where the gaps are and what the issue was and you try and fit them. And I know that hasn't been the way that the arts sector has worked previously, but certainly the Arts Council strategy is about meeting the needs of communities and obviously schools are part of that community. So, it makes sense to approach it more like that, and that sounds like what you're doing, Karen. - Yeah, and I think we very much kind of, we less see our role as a provider, and more of a facilitator. Our role is to facilitate great art and my job is to connect audiences with great artists. That's what we do. And our job is to connect great freelancers with great community projects and we're that glue in between to make those things happen. And as part of being an NPO and being a bigger organization, yeah, we do take on some of the admin and the stuff that no-one wants to do and all the rest of it, but that's our role, and that's what we should be doing, is doing far more of that connecting and less of the delivering. And it's interesting, I think, what you say about being in any other sector. In any other sector, if there was a project, you would tender for who was the best person to deliver that project, and even within a big organization, you would still tender for the best project manager. - The freelancers, that's really pretty exciting, isn't it? Potentially there's more work for freelancers going forward because the spec to other arts organizations will be feeling and thinking and doing similar to the Dukes. - And also, I think there's also a need for us to start to understand where we fit in creative profession or careers for young people as well. So I think there's a big conversation around how do we facilitate more young people to see the arts and creative industries as a viable income source? - As a viable career, yeah, which is a really interesting conversation, particularly this week, as we've all been labeled unviable. - When you think of what technician in a big theater is earning, you know, 50, 60,000 pounds a year, and that's a unviable career? - I know. - Yeah, it's crazy. Everyone is gonna get more competitive and that's only gonna raise the quality of the arts, not just in Lancashire, but across the country, really. And maybe that's what's needed in some ways. - And I think if organizations play it right, and start to act as facilitators, I think, actually, we'll recover a lot faster than we think we will. - That's a good note to end on, Karen. - Thanks for listening to "The Gathering." If you liked this episode, let us know in the reviews and don't forget to share it with your friends. For show notes, links to all the organizations and initiatives mentioned in this episode, and much more, head over to www.artslancashire.org.uk/thegathering. You can also follow us on Twitter, @ArtsLancashire.