The digital print on Revive, the much-welcomed new national cultural policy, had barely hit our screens before the Australian Senate initiated an inquiry into its shortcomings.
When Revive went public on 30 January this year, Arts Minister Tony Burke rightly proclaimed that ‘Revive will set the arts sector on a new trajectory with fresh momentum’. The policy is built on five pillars – First Nations first; A Place for Every Story; Centrality of the Artist; Strong Cultural Infrastructure; and Engaging the Audience. It committed substantial funding ($286m over four years with more to come in the May budget) and will see a dramatic institutional shake-up with the establishment of Creative Australia.
With so much to celebrate in the new policy, it may seem churlish to start reviewing it two weeks later (15 February). Yet, on this occasion, it hasn’t been a case of the Senate nit-picking, claiming its intent was to ensure that a good policy was as strong as it could be from the outset.
While Music Education: Right from the Start , the national collaborative initiative led by Alberts I The Tony Foundation, shares the excitement across the Arts community, we did welcome this opportunity to respond formally to Revive.
Our concern is that Revive, as it currently stands, misses the significant opportunity to properly recognise the place and purpose of a quality music education as foundational to a vibrant and prospering creative industry. Music education is critical to a genuinely whole-of-government cultural policy. This is one area in which Revive is clearly deficient.
Revive covers a lot of ground which may explain its disappointingly light touch when it comes to music education amidst the broad recognition of arts education’s importance in developing artistic and creative skills and fostering cultural appreciation and participation.
While it affirms the personal, developmental and educational benefits of Arts education, Revive misses the opportunity to recognise and redress the shortcomings to date in delivering on the promise of the Australian curriculum that was a central facet of the Gillard Government’s Creative Australia. Revive is silent when it comes to music education and the overwhelming body of research demonstrating the substantial benefits of a quality music education.
In a bleak education landscape, quality music education offers a proven path to lifting the spirits, building collaboration and a sense of belonging, to getting the creative juices flowing, to stimulating the brains and lifting attainment in literacy and numeracy for our students. All essential to personal well-being and a thriving arts community.
Revive, in its present form, opens the door slightly but the opportunity remains to more fully capture the benefits of a quality music education both for Australian students and for building our music industry from the ground up.
