There is a specific curriculum of arts education in the formal system of education in the CR and there also exist various forms of extracurricular arts activities. The methodology also provides room for the inclusion of elective educational subjects and courses that can be integrated into the teaching programme of other school subjects. In current international discussions about arts education curricula, the increasingly prevailing opinion is that students should have active and long-term exposure to and encounters with high-quality art that is balanced by direct experience with every branch of the arts, primarily within the framework of compulsory school attendance. The ideal curriculum from an educational perspective is one that overcomes traditional divisions into individual subjects, the division into the humanities and the sciences, and reflects an integrated approach to the world in educating students.
Interest-based and informal education is an essential part of the system of continuing education in the CR. It is an integral part of national strategies and documents related to the concept of lifelong learning. Unlike formal education, however, it takes place outside or beyond the framework of curricular education.
There are several arts organisations in the CR that offer schools experiential education programmes that employ artistic methods. The Society for Creativity in Education in 2018 initiated the creation of a platform through which these organisations come together. They work together in an effort to obtain systemic support using the arts in educational instruction. Since 2013 the Society has also been engaged in the Creative Partnerships programme, which focuses on developing the quality of education and on introducing creative methods in educational instruction. In 2018 the conference School and the Arts was organised, where the results of arts projects conducted at schools so far were presented along with examples of best practices, and the needs and goals were defined for further developing the cooperation of schools with artists and teachers.
In 2019, the international conference “What should education for the 21st century look like? Creative Cities Educate through Art”. The purpose of the conference was to highlight the importance of creativity in education, to articulate its benefits for employment in the labour market and in business, and to find ways to systemically support education through the arts at the city and regional level.
Another event that the Society for Creativity in Education co-founded was World Creativity and Innovation Week, which focused on education for the first time in 2022. A series of events, including conferences, were organised in the CR to promote the wider use of creativity, art and innovation in education in primary and secondary schools in the country as the Creative Education is Coming to the Czech Republic debate, which focused on changes in education and cooperation between education and culture.
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