Evaluating Creative Partnerships

1. Evaluating Creative Partnerships Presentation to the Cultural Competencies Conference, Warsaw, July 2011 Caroline Sharp, National Foundation for Educational Research, UK

2. NFER’s evaluation role National evaluation of Creative Partnerships 2004 – 2006 Longer term impact studies (2003 onwards) Results are based on around 400 schools and 61,000 pupils in each study.

3. Identifying the longer-term impact of Creative Partnerships

4. Attainment Analysis at 2 levels: School level: compared Creative Partnerships schools with other similar schools Pupil level: compared pupils who took part in Creative Partnerships activities with those who did not, in the same schools

5. Significant results at school level

6. Significant results at pupil level

7. Size of the effect Pupils involved in Creative Partnerships made significantly better progress in attainment, especially at secondary school Effect sizes were relatively small (typically 0.10). The threshold for an ‘educationally significant’ effect is 0.25.

8. Absence rates (2002-8) There were no overall differences between schools involved in Creative Partnerships and those not involved But there was a positive difference for primary schools which increased for schools involved in Creative Partnerships for several years

9. Primary School Absence Rates

10. Conclusion There is a pattern of statistically significant results favouring Creative Partnerships. The results suggest that pupils involved in Creative Partnerships activities made slightly greater progress in academic assessments at age 11, 14 and 16 Primary schools involved in Creative Partnerships for longer improved their rates of attendance

11. Further information For further information, see: http://www.creative-partnerships.com/ http://www.nfer.ac.uk/research/arts-creative-and-cultural-education Contact: c.sharp@nfer.ac.uk