Potencial nacional

4.4.10.

It became apparent that there may be a relationship between student ability and their experience within secondary education and further education – an issue about which subjects were very vocal. The biggest complaint focussed on a perceived lack of drawing ability among students, and how this subsequently affected performance during their courses.

Powell (M, 2017) set the scene for this: “there are things that you should have at the point

you arrive at university and our students increasingly don’t have those, and that’s where the sketching comes in.” Downs (2017) elaborated, on this lack of skill-set: “if they could do nothing else but draw to ideate well… everything would be so much easier and you will be able to teach at university level to a much higher level.” Proctor (2018) observed a shift in

priorities as a possible reason for this: “I used to draw every day… kids don’t do that

anymore.”

Stacey (M, 2016) suggested that primary education was as a starting point for the development of sketch inhibition, with children as young as seven “thinking that their

very early scribbles or conceptual artwork isn’t good enough.” Additionally, he referred to

the largely female influence upon children in education at that age, describing, “female

teacher values being imposed on kids … making everything neat and tidy and pretty.”

Individual teaching style was identified as an important factor in shaping student attitudes, (and potentially their lifelong approach), to drawing and sketching. Lerpiniere (2017) stated: “it is about what happens at school… how they are encouraged.”

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Likewise, Proctor (2018) noted the effects of discouragement on young children:

“everyone can draw, all children draw, until they are about eight and someone says ‘you’re crap at drawing,’ and they stop.”

The regard for art in schools was considered by Powell, (M, 2017). He described a somewhat depressing hierarchy of subjects: “if you are smart at school you will forced into

the STEM or academic subjects. If you’re a bit less smart you go into the humanities. As you go down the ‘what is important to the schools rankings,’ you start moving people down to where they are doing you no damage - and they underpin the arts.” He also described how art

subjects were subscribed to by three types of student: “of the ones who really wanted it…

there are the ones who are hopeless at everything else, and people… too lazy to do anything else.” He also described talented art students being disadvantaged by the education

system: “stop short-changing the art students… they deserve to be as good as they can in the

fields that they want to get into, so teach them some fundamental skills,” (Powell, M. 2017).

The national curriculum was a source of frustration, Downs, (2017): “I see really excellent

teachers in… high schools who are horribly inhibited by a terrible curriculum.” He believed,

like Powell, the ability to engage in art-based subjects was being undermined in favour of more academic subjects due to: “the demands of government on the curriculum.” As a result of this, and according Schenk (2017), “writing and arithmetic are all favoured, but…

drawing should be favoured as much; there is very little, on the curriculum now… it’s fundamental for everybody, and…education loses from (it) not being seen as a fundamental thing in class.”

The issue of mandatory testing throughout secondary education was contentious. Booth, (2017), who suggested that “the majority of students are very good at taking tests…

but they are generally not much better at anything else.” Because of this, he maintained, “we’ve learned how to be not creative as we go through the education system."

Of the art syllabus in secondary schools, Downs (2017) was disparaging, suggesting the approach was inappropriate to building relevant skills: “they are supposed to go and

131 observe some artist… and derive some information from doing some stylistic mimicry, or…

(gain) expert knowledge of… production systems and applications that would be too much to

ask from PhD students.” Bramston (2017) described the confusion between design and

fine art within schools, the different approaches to the disciplines not recognised: “you

ask them to sketch an idea (and) they will do it (with) their art department head on, so they will spend a long time… putting down an idea… putting down too much information.”

The A-level syllabus garnered some strong opinion. Proctor (2018) was critical of the current system: “Stop doing things like A-level textiles, it’s a waste of bloody time…Teach

them how to draw, encourage them to draw - all this farting about.” She described her

attempts to get schools to, “just get them to draw… we want them to come and have a really

good basic skill.” Lerpiniere (2017) identified the same issue: “It’s good to have a textiles A- level but I would prefer, personally, to see… a drawing. We can teach them how to weave and… to knit… but really it’s about the potential.” Lawson (2017) suggested the plethora

of alternative design-based A-levels was a distraction from learning proper skills: “if

design technology didn't exist people would have done art.” Interestingly, Downs (2017)

cited the public school system as providing a better foundation for students entering university, suggesting that those who had come through this had the benefit of being

“taught drawing in a more formal and traditional method” – a skill he believed stood them

in good stead for their HE experience.

Bramston (2017) suggested both GCSE and A-level design courses didn’t imbue students with an accurate understanding of design. Students’ output, he noticed, was mainly, “a sheet full of writing… images… one drawing in the corner represent(ing) a thing

that they are going to make… but that one drawing hasn't come about from a process of 100 sketches.”

Lawson, (2017) observed the type of drawing that students were taught within A-level art was mainly “drawing from their imagination… which is good to a point but…what they

132 their drawings are of the wrong sort… we don't beat them up for that - that's the education system.”

An artefact-centric approach to drawing appeared to exist within secondary education. Whether originating with the syllabus or through imposition of individuals, it clearly had an effect upon output and caused issues for design students within higher education. Downs (2017) was sure that “high school courses confuse rendering with

drawing at every level… most of them think that they are trying to get a life-like rendering.”

Downs (2017) suggested that this approach was of little value to students at his institution: “it doesn't work for my colleagues in fine art… textiles and… visual

communication.” This reverence towards the sketch as an artefact, (as opposed to a

visual thinking process), was identified by several subjects. Bramston (2017) described its effect among A-level students: “there is a lot of respect for the paper - there is too much

respect, you know, the best handwriting has gone onto there and it's all in columns.”

Stacey (M, 2016) observed the typical teacher’s attitude within primary education: “it

wasn’t obvious to her that pushing kids… into producing neat and tidy, perfect artwork… at the investment of a lot of effort was either educationally valuable or imposing values that ought to be imposed.” Fitton (2016) added: “they spend so long at school working through a process to get to the final element …’do this, do this, you’ve attained perfection,’ and the whole

emphasis and the grades are based on the end product… there is not enough weighting given to the process.”

In respect of secondary art and design education, Downs (2017) made this final damning statement about the syllabus: “I have been a paid consultant by one of the exam

boards on this, and I was quite rude about a lot of the assumptions that they had when it got to A-level... If you want to quote me, you can say that the whole of the pre-Foundation or the pre- BTEC sector for Art and Design drawing should be burned to the ground.”

The routes into design HE, specifically art foundation and BTEC art and design courses were discussed. Art foundation courses were preferred by subjects, Powell (M, 2017):

133 “our preferred route tends to be good traditional A-level art and traditional foundation course. Those students tend to be better enculturated, more grounded in the fundamentals and therefore more able to take on the extra stuff.” Lerpiniere (2017) noted the benefit of this route “the ones who do foundations obviously have a much better grounding because…they do life

drawing… and it builds up their confidence, but… sometimes they’re ready to do a degree after A-levels.” Downs (2017) too identified that “foundation courses are excellent and do a good job,” but additionally, “most students will still come from a previous A-level position or BTEC.”

Powell (M, 2017) raised concern about the recruitment of demotivated and weak

students onto degree courses because of the removal of the mandatory requirement for art foundation. In the past, typically, “You definitely didn’t get onto a degree course if you

had no foundation… now all of those barriers are away.” He contended that BTEC courses

were an issue. Asked about the BTEC equivalence to A-level plus foundation, he responded, “don’t use the word equivalent, we all know they’re not! They’ve be made to stay

on in some form of education post sixteen and that’s now the gateway into a degree course.” He

added, “BTEC students are the worst… they’re not the most academic students in the world -

they’ve been driven down that route because they’ve got no other options.” On being asked

about the content of BTEC courses, he continued, “they’re bad because of the way they’re

setup and the reason they’re set up, and the fact that the curriculum generally doesn’t contain anything of any value to any subsequent degree course; no drawing, no proper 3-D modelling skills… you can be very poor at school, very disengaged, end up doing a BTEC arty route, and… they have introduced some new BTECs to try and persuade young people to engage and called them things like ‘game development.’”