Regional Arts Victoria is pleased to be working with the Victorian Government on a plan to embed creative professionals in government schools.
Supported through the Working for Victoria program, the Creative Workers in Schools project will create more than 160 jobs for Victorian artists and other creative professionals.
The new jobs will support professional creative workers, such as artists, designers, musicians, filmmakers and writers get back into work including those who have lost their jobs as a result of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
The Creative Workers in Schools program has been developed to offer new learning experiences to students and teachers while providing employment opportunities to Victorians in the creative industries.
Creative professionals will work with teachers and students on curriculum-aligned creative projects. Students from Foundation through to Year 10 will learn new creative skills across a range of subjects.
Creatives will be matched with schools based on shared skills and goals and will receive on-the-job support and mentorship throughout their placement. Training will be delivered to prepare participants for working in community settings and with diverse cohorts, boosting their employability beyond the program.
Paid training will begin in January with the first placements to start in Term 1, 2021. The program will run in two stages across terms 1-3 next year in government schools across the state.
The program is a partnership between Working for Victoria, the Department of Education and Training and Creative Victoria, and will be delivered in collaboration with Regional Arts Victoria, a peak body for artists and arts organisations with a strong track record of delivering state-wide creative programs for government.
“With 50 years’ experience supporting school incursion programs in Victoria, we’ve seen how transformative projects like Creative Workers in Schools can be,” said Regional Arts Victoria CEO Joe Toohey.
“We can’t wait to see what our creatives, students and teachers make of this extraordinary opportunity.”
More information on the Creative Workers in Schools project, including details on how to apply, is available here