Creative Youth 2023-2027, launched on 28 March 2023, is one of five pillars of the Creative Ireland Programme. Creative Youth aims to enable the creativity of every child and young person, and the Department of Education, the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, the Department of Equality, Children, Disability, Integration and Youth, the Department of Further and Higher Education and the Arts Council are key partners in delivering Creative Youth.
Under Creative Youth, the Department of Education fund the programmes below:
Creative Clusters is an initiative of the Department of Education, led by and in partnership with the Education Support Centres Ireland (ESCI) and part of Creative Youth 2023-2027 launched on 28 March 2023 and is one of five pillars of the Creative Ireland Programme. Creative Youth aims to enable the creativity of every child and young person, and the Department of Education, the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, the Department of Equality, Children, Disability, Integration and Youth, the Department of Further and Higher Education and the Arts Council are key partners in delivering Creative Youth.
A Creative Cluster will typically consist of between 3 and 5 schools collaborating on the design, implementation, evaluation and dissemination of an innovative creative learning project which supports them to address a common issue or challenge. Creative Clusters will include schools at different stages of their journey in using creativity in the classroom. Clusters can consist of primary schools only, post-primary schools only or a combination of primary, post-primary schools, special education schools and Youthreach organisations. Clusters can be drawn from existing networks or result from the creation of new ones.
Each cluster must nominate a lead school. The lead school must identify a Creative Cluster Coordinator who would normally be a member of the school’s teaching or senior leadership team. Substitution will be provided for one representative from each school to attend the Cluster Workshop and Cluster Meetings. It is recommended that the same representative attend these events throughout the life of the Cluster. The Lead School Coordinators will receive an additional 2 days’ substitution cover to work on the Cluster project in Year 1 and in Year 2 of the initiative. If the application is successful, the co-ordinator will be responsible for managing the day-to- day operation of the project and will act as a single point of contact during the duration of the project. The other schools in each cluster must nominate a representative to participate in the project.
Each Creative Cluster will receive funding of €3,000 per school in each cluster over a two-year period to implement their project in the 2024–2026 school years (e.g. a cluster of 3 schools would get €9,000 over two years while a cluster of 5 schools would receive €15,000 over two years). Schools in a cluster are expected to collaborate on how this funding is allocated and spent to support the implementation of their project. Clusters will receive 50% of the total funding in Year 1, with the second 50% being provided in Year 2
The Department of Education has developed a new innovative Arts-in-Education BLAST Residency Programme in 2021, which will enable up to 400 new Arts-in-Education Residencies in schools each year.
The aim of this scheme is to give pupils in schools all over the country the opportunity to work with a professional artist on unique projects, to be originated and planned between the artist, the teacher and the school, under the coordination of the Education Support Centres Ireland ESCI's network of 21 full-time education centres. More information can be found at BLAST Arts-in-Education
The Department of Education, in partnership with the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media and other stakeholders, is currently involved in developing a new Creative Youth Plan 2023-2027 as a key pillar of the Creative Ireland Programme 2023-2027.
A wide-ranging consultation process involving several strands is being undertaken by the Department of Education, the Department of Children Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth Affairs, and the Arts Council. For its part, the Department of Education established an Internal Steering Group and a short-term Creative Youth Consultative Stakeholder Group comprising relevant internal and external stakeholders comprising both education and creative organisations.
Here you can find the Department of Education Stakeholder and Schools Consultation on Creative Youth Plan 2023-2027 Report.
Department of Education Stakeholder and Schools Consultation on Creative Youth Plan 2023-2027
Consultation Report May 2022
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Creative Clusters is a pilot initiative of the Government of Ireland’s Department of Education (DoE). The initiative provides opportunities for clusters of schools to come together to experiment, innovate and collaborate on the design, implementation and evaluation of bespoke arts and creative learning projects. In this way, Creative Clusters seeks to promote new ways of collaboration between schools, and between schools and the arts and cultural sectors. These collaborations are designed to improve teaching and learning, and to enable learners and teachers to develop their creativity. Creative Clusters is funded through the Government of Ireland’s School Excellence Fund, a fund dedicated to encouraging and supporting local collaboration and innovation in Ireland’s schools. Creative Clusters is led by the DoE in partnership with Education Support Centres Ireland (ESCI), a national network of 21 full-time local Centres.
Creative Clusters: A Collaborative approach to Cultivating Creativity in Schools
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The Teacher-Artist Partnership (TAP) initiative is a Department of Education led programme, the aim of which is to empower teachers and artists to enhance the creative potential of every child through collaborative practice in primary and special schools. The TAP Summer Course equips teachers with the knowledge, experience and skills to integrate the arts and creativity into their classroom practice and to work in partnership with artists and children. For artists and creative practitioners TAP enables them to develop their professional skills and perspectives on working in partnership with teachers and children in education.
In the school year following the TAP Summer Course teachers, artists and children work in creative partnership through in-school residencies. The TAP initiative was launched as a pilot programme in 2014 under the Arts in Education Charter 2013. Since 2017, it has been implemented as a Creative Youth initiative under Pillar 1 of the Creative Ireland Programme 2017-2022. In 2023 TAP extended its reach to cultural and creative practitioners within and beyond the arts to become Teacher Artist Partnership+ (TAP+). TAP+ is a key professional development and in-school residency initiative of the Creative Youth Plan 2023-2027, under the Creative Ireland Programme 2023-2027.
This report sets out the findings of an evaluation of the Teacher-Artist Partnership initiative (TAP) that took place between December 2021 and October 2022. The purpose of the evaluation is to 1) enhance understanding of the experience of teachers and artists that have taken part in the TAP initiative and 2) its impact on participating schools. The evaluation also assesses the overall management, infrastructure and administration of the initiative and makes recommendations as to how it might be developed, enhanced and further embedded into the working of schools in future.
This report presents the experience of children and young people participating in face-to-face TAP residencies in schools that took place between October and December 2022. The purpose of the evaluation is to 1) enhance understanding of children and young people's experience of TAP and 2) to establish areas for programme development to enhance practice and embed the arts and creative practice in primary and special schools.
I am Creative’ is a pilot initiative of the Government of Ireland’s Department of Education. The initiative was designed to explore ways in which teachers, artists, school leaders and Special Needs Assistants (SNAs) could collaborate towards enhancing the provision for arts education in Special Education (SE) settings. Read the final report here: