Opinion: Broad and balanced? Not from where I'm standing

There has been a trend recently in secondary schools to adopt the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) – a government-encouraged initiative for students in Years 10 and 11. It is described as a performance measure for ‘any student who achieves good GCSE or accredited Certificate passes in English, mathematics, history or geography, two sciences and a language.’ The claim is that this recognises the importance of ‘a balanced curriculum’, though with one glaring and obvious omission – that of arts subjects and, in particular, music.

Many without artistic or musical leanings may look at the above list and see it as a perfectly reasonable template for children to work towards – particularly those who are ‘academic’. I would argue that the inflexibility of this is not only unhelpful, but it could potentially be damaging to students of all abilities. The weakness lies in the fact that only one option is left from a potentially vast list of ‘others’, ranging from economics and IT through to art, drama and music. The consequence is obvious: fewer children can opt for these subjects, with the result that they are downgraded in status and standard. I offer you a specific example from a head of music who went from having 26 students in a GCSE Music class – every one of whom gained at least a B grade – to a class of nine – none of whom played an instrument. Aside from the demoralising effect on the teacher concerned, this gave a clear message to the rest of the school community that music was no longer valued as a ‘serious’ subject.