The AccessHE Creative HE Apply Guide – 4 months on

The AccessHE Creative HE Apply Guide launched with great success on Monday 9th July 2018.  

Since launching over 400 hard copies of the guide have been circulated to 40 organisations, while the digital print file has been shared with 11 different organisations from Uni Connects to HEIs, Arts education charities and schools and colleges. The guide itself has been downloaded 180 times by 170 unique users.

The guide offers concise information and support for learners interested in applying to creative HE courses who maybe otherwise discouraged from pursuing their passions for the Creative Arts. By signposting young people to free creative opportunities and highlighting the different pathways into creative courses, the differences between multi-faculty study, small specialist study and conservatoire training and finally by summarising the difference between UCAS, UCAS Conservatoires and direct to institutional applications, the guide hope to arm prospective students will all the tools to make an informed decision about their futures.

The AccessHE Creative HE Apply Guide  aims to guide prospective student through the application process, from early preparation and decision-making to portfolio, audition and interview advice. A helpful timeline sets out deadlines for UCAS and UCAS Conservatoires  and young people are offered the opportunity to think about their individual priorities for study from location (city or not city), type of tuition (vocational training or seminar based training), and opportunities such as years abroad or in industry.

Research has shown that over the past five years, entries to arts GCSEs have fallen by almost 150,00 and that there has been an overall 25.6% drop in entries to arts GCSEs since 2014 when then total entries have risen by 3.4%. This has been largely due to the impact of the EBacc and the narrowing of the curriculum which has subsequently followed. Not only will this detrimentally effect the talent pipeline of the Creative industries but it will also continue to push arts out of schools and into extracurricular activity which often favours learners from more advantaged backgrounds.  

AccessHE are now planning for supplementary materials to support guide such as a reorganisation of the AccessHE Creative website to better reflect the guide and a series of worksheet to support learner engagement with the guide.  Planning is also underway for version two of the guide, which we hope will be a wider collaboration allowing for a more nationally representative guide.

There are still some copies of the AccessHE Creative HE Apply Guide available. To request a copy or access to the digital print file of the guide please contact Vanessa Baptista.