Alice Demba Appointed Cultural Education Coordinator for Liverpool

I’m writing to introduce myself as the newly appointed Cultural Education Coordinator for Liverpool who will be helping you connect with the education sector. My role is to focus on how the art and cultural sector can support the needs of children and young people aged 0-19, and the people working directly with them. Please share this message with anyone you think it is relevant to across your networks (LARC, COoL, etc) and apologies for cross-posting. If you would like me to take your details off my list, or clarify the best contact at your organisation, please let me know.

I’ll be meeting Head Teachers and school representatives over the next few weeks to discuss their needs in relation to art and culture. I will review what we know about this already and will see some of you at LARC and COoL meetings. I’ll also be developing ways to communicate with you effectively beyond these meetings.

I’m aware that arts and cultural organisations are already offering a vast array of opportunities to schools and children and young people. My aim is to develop ways of helping teachers to navigate these offers so that we can signpost them to what is useful for their role and relevant for children and young people. I will work directly with teachers, children and young people and heads of participation and learning from arts and cultural organisations, to hear a diverse range of voices and involve the relevant people. Your work may connect to learning and engagement, health and general well-being, talent development or career pathways: all are crucial and it’s vital that schools can access resources as quickly and easily as possible.

I look forward to working with you!

In the meantime I want to flag up an opportunity for you to share arts and cultural activities and resources with schools by contributing to the Liverpool Maths Party on Friday 17 June 2016. The Liverpool Learning Partnership is encouraging teachers to celebrate the beauty and magic of maths on this day, and we’re supporting schools to organise fun and interactive maths activities. One thousand pupils will receive a party bag, and all Liverpool pupils can access a virtual party bag, which they click on to access online activities at school and at home.

There are many ways that art and cultural organisations could get involved to support this, for example:

• Do you have any maths resources? Could you get involved in developing some, that link to your current exhibitions and activities? They could be physical (to be put in the actual party bags) or digital (for the virtual party bags).
• Could you host a party activity at your venue on the day?
• Would you be willing to visit a school on the day to run an activity? Or could you run something at a local park? For example, Calderstones Park is running an orienteering activity. Could you develop something that involves maths to create a temporary art installation in a public space?

If you can get involved, I would love to hear from you by Friday 15 April so that I can share your ideas with schools in good time for them to plan how to work with you. We need to receive final online resources for the virtual party bag by Friday 20 May.

Best wishes

Alice

Alice Demba

Cultural Education Coordinator

Liverpool Learning Partnership