Education Select Committee renews call for music to be included in the EBacc

The 2019 Music Education: State of the Nation report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Music Education, University of Sussex and the Incorporated Society of Musicians (ISM) highlighted the impact of accountability measures on music education. In secondary schools, the introduction of the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) in 2010 has had a devastating impact on arts subjects, as schools place more emphasis on the subjects which are included in the measure: English, maths, science, languages and humanities. Darren Henley’s Review of Music Education in 2011 warned that if music was not one of the subjects included in the EBacc then it risked being devalued. It is clear that over the past decade this has proved to be true.

Exam entry figures from the Joint Council of Qualifications (JCQ) show a significant decline in the number of pupils taking GCSE music, with a fall of 25% between 2010 and 2020. The impacts are also felt at Key Stage 5 where music A-Level entries fell by 47% between 2008 and 2020. In 2018, Ofsted found that around half of secondary schools had moved to a two-year Key Stage 3 to enable pupils to cover the sheer amount of content in EBacc subjects, which had resulted in the further marginalisation of practical and creative subjects.

The ISM has been calling for EBacc reform since it launched the #BaccfortheFuture campaign in 2012. Adding a ‘sixth pillar’ to the EBacc for creative subjects, including music, was also one of the key recommendations of the State of the Nation report and would help address the significant barriers to children and young people’s access to higher-level study or performing opportunities.

The ISM therefore welcomed the recent Education Select Committee report which calls on the Department for Education to expand the EBacc to include creative subjects. The report, published on 22 June and entitled The forgotten: how White working-class pupils have been let down, and how to change it, criticises the Department for Education’s current approach to closing the disadvantage gap. It is particularly critical of the Minister for School Standards, the Rt Hon Nick Gibb’s championing of the EBacc and ‘core academic subjects’ as a way to support disadvantaged pupils, with the committee not convinced that the current approach will be successful in its aim.

The report cites evidence given to the committee that suggests that the current curriculum may be disengaging disadvantaged White pupils and could lead to a ‘two-tier system, where schools value vocational, practical and creative subjects less highly’. The committee goes on to say that they are concerned about the Department for Education’s narrow focus on academic subjects as a ‘benchmark for success’ in education up to the age of 16 and that this is a barrier for some schools and pupils.

Finally, the report calls for the Department for Education to reform the current accountability measures by widening the range of subjects that can count towards the EBacc to include subjects that have been in decline over the past 10 years. The committee wants to ‘incentivise schools to celebrate all their pupils’ aptitudes and create a parity of esteem for vocational subjects alongside a rigorous academic offer'.

This is not, however, the first time that a Select Committee has called for EBacc reform. As early as 2013 the Culture, Media and Sport Committee recommended in its Supporting the creative economy report that the arts be added to the five subject areas of the EBacc. They stated that ‘the broader arts curriculum has been seriously hit by the Government’s approach to performance measurement which we deeply regret.’

The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee have called twice on the government to address the issues associated with the EBacc. The Live Music report of March 2019 found  that, ‘despite the Schools Minister’s assertion that “the EBacc is about social mobility”, the way it works in practice unduly impacts on pupils from deprived backgrounds, or those with lower attainment.’ The Committee repeated the call from 2013 for arts subjects to be added to the EBacc stating that, ‘the concerns we have heard during this inquiry suggest the need is no less pressing now'.

The committee’s May 2019 report, Changing Lives: the social impact of participation in culture and sport, criticised the downgrading of arts subjects in both English and Welsh schools, stating that they were ‘deeply concerned’ by the evidence presented to them and calling again on government to take action. The committee were ‘deeply concerned about the gap between the government’s reassuring rhetoric and the evidence presented to us of the decline in music provision in state schools, for which the EBacc is blamed and which affects students from less advantaged socio-economic backgrounds disproportionately.’ Once again, they reiterated the call to add arts subjects to the EBacc in their recommendations.

The question remains, how many more times must a Select Committee call on the government for a change in accountability measures before action is taken? It is vital that the government act now before any more time is lost.

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