STEAM, which puts the arts into STEM, promotes a more flexible educational approach and recognises the skills inherent in the arts ? primarily creativity
Just five years ago the Government-backed campaign for STEM leapt into the public consciousness with a vengeance when we were told our children?s future chances depended on them studying the subjects.
Stark warnings abounded about the UK falling behind in the global marketplace. Science, technology, engineering and maths were the alleged key to international success.
Schools were told that they must do more to promote STEM, and the arts were effectively devalued when the then-Education Secretary Nicky Morgan said the previous generation had got it wrong when they opted for the arts.
Coupled with the introduction of the Government?s controversial eBacc, record numbers of students shunned arts subjects.Senior figures in the arts world were outraged, with Nigel Carrington, vice-chancellor of the University of the Arts London, calling it an ?absurd discrimination?. A combined approach
But, amid the outcry, an innovation from the US was quietly slipping into the education sector to correct that imbalance: STEAM.
Across the board, UK universities are embracing the concept, building comprehensive strategies around it as a future tenet of teaching and research.
Projects incorporating science and the arts have sprung up at campuses around the UK.
Universities have recognised that STEAM can promote a combined approach to learning wh...