Children And Young People’s Learning To Benefit As Government Announces £9.4 Million Investment In Museums And Galleries Education

29 December 2005, Museums and Galleries across England received a £9.4 million boost today as the Government announced new funding for educational work. Children and young people across the country will benefit as national and regional museums and galleries will work closely with schools and help bring the curriculum to life.

Culture Minister, David Lammy, and Schools Minister, Andrew Adonis, announced that the Department for Culture Media and Sport (DCMS) and the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) would jointly invest £9.4m from 2006 to 2008 in strengthening the ability of museums and galleries to support children and young people’s education.

This new funding builds on the £7 million invested over the past two years in museum education projects, a national programme of secondments for teachers and museum staff and complements the work of regional museum hubs under the Renaissance in the Regions programme.

Culture Minister David Lammy said:

“I am hugely impressed with the quality and impact of educational work undertaken by museums and galleries in partnership with schools. The work is helping to enhance and enrich delivery of the curriculum at all key stages. The new funding announced today will build on the foundations created in the past two years and will be used to create more opportunities to enrich the learning of school age children and young people across the country. It will complement the successful regional museums education work funded by the Renaissance in the Regions initiative. “

David Lammy added:

“The funding will enable museums and galleries to build capacity and develop educational activities tailored to meet the needs of a range of pupils inside and outside the classroom in communities across the country.”

Schools Minister, Andrew Adonis, said:

“Museums and galleries can play an important role in enriching the curriculum, stimulating school children’s learning and developing their creativity. We are keen to see more children and young people given the opportunity to make the most of them. This is why museums and galleries will have a central role to play in our Education outside the Classroom manifesto.”

“The new funding will be used to strengthen and extend partnership working between museums, galleries and schools. The professional development element of the programme will enable teachers and museum educators to gain a better understanding of each other’s needs and provide a better experience for children and young people.”


Editor’s Notes
This press notice relates to ’England’

Examples of museum and gallery education projects that have received Government support over the last 2 years include:

Real Science: a partnership between the Natural History Museum, Hancock Museum, Oxford University Museum of Natural History, Manchester Museum and King’s College London. The museums have drawn on their collections, resources and expertise to develop a programme of science based workshops and encounters with world class scientists, which is designed to enrich and enhance teaching of the secondary science curricula.

Partners in Time: Imperial War Museum Duxford and museums throughout Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Suffolk have taken objects into the classroom and provided schools with free visits to the museum (and provided assistance with transport costs) in order to support the teaching of history, literacy and science for primary schools in rural and economically deprived areas in the East of England region.

Understanding Slavery Initiative: the National Maritime Museum, National Museums Liverpool, Bristol Museums & Art Gallery, British Empire and Commonwealth Museum and Hull City Museums & Art Gallery have collaborated to produce materials for schools about the transatlantic slave trade to support the teaching of history and citizenship and offer teachers CPD and INSET training, which is designed to help them teach this potentially sensitive subject in the classroom.

En-quire: as one part of this project four contemporary art galleries - Whitechapel Art Gallery, Chisenhale Gallery, Bow Arts Trust and SPACE - have worked with pupils from a diverse range of ethnic backgrounds in secondary schools in east London on an extended programme of classroom based activities and gallery visits with the aim of developing the young people’s analytical skills, critical awareness and understanding of socio-cultural issues.

Learning Links: 210 teachers and 82 museum/gallery/archive staff across England have taken part in this programme of secondments working in either a museum or archive or a school for up to five days. During the placements, most staff work with their placement partner to create learning resources.


1. Today’s announcement was made by David Lammy, Minister for Culture, DCMS, and Andrew Adonis, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, DfES.

2. Between 2006 and 2008 DCMS and DfES will allocate £9.4m to support the education work of England’s museums and galleries. Overall, £4.7m will available in 2006-07 (£2.7m from DCMS and £2m from DfES) and £4.7m in 2007-08 (£2.7m from DCMS and £2m from DfES).

3. This new funding builds on the £7 million invested by DCMS and DfES to support museum and gallery education work in the past two years and will complement the education work of the Renaissance in the Regions programme, which is revitalising the infrastructure of regional museums through £30m annual investment by DCMS.

4. The funding will be used to support the following areas:

• National and regional museums strategic education development fund: twelve* national museums and their regional partners will receive a grant to spend on strategic education work of their choosing with the overall aim of strengthening partnership working across the country.

• Regional education development fund: Each of the nine regional Museums, Libraries and Archives Councils will receive a grant to provide educational activities, which address local priorities.

• Teacher and museum educator professional development programme: funding will be channelled through the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) to continue a national (England) programme of secondments in collaboration with Arts Council England.

• Support for gallery education work: funding will be channelled through Arts Council England to continue the En-quire programme, which supports the education work of galleries without permanent collections.


* British Museum, Imperial War Museum, National Gallery, National Maritime Museum, National Museums Liverpool, National Portrait Gallery, Natural History Museum, NMSI, Tate, V&A, Wallace Collection and the British Library.

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