Music Education Hubs are changing …
Following the publication of the new National Plan for Music Education, The Power of Music to Change Lives, Arts Council England (ACE), on behalf of the Department for Education (DfE), began the process of inviting applications for organisations to lead Hubs in the future.
Since 2012, NMPAT has been the lead partner of the Northamptonshire Music Education Hub, and since 2013, we have also had responsibility for the Music Education Hub in Rutland, famously not only the smallest county in the country, but the smallest Music Education Hub too. Through our delivery arm, Rutland Music, we have been supporting music education in our neighbouring county as well as Northamptonshire.
The new National Plan announced that it was the intention for there to be fewer Hubs covering larger geographic areas in the future and launched a consultation process to gather opinion about what that should look like. With this in mind, it was obvious that if there were going to be fewer Hubs covering larger geographic areas, then the smallest Hub in the country was under some threat. We decided to take a pragmatic step of asking ACE to formally merge the two hubs, and the new Northamptonshire and Rutland Hub will come into existence on 1st April 2023.
This also positioned ourselves for the consultation process, when the DfE asked ACE to consider proposals to reduce the number of hubs from 118 to 85, 40 or 10. The publication last week of a proposed map for future Hubs sees an indicative figure of 43, with some very large Hubs created, covering multiple large counties.
The headline news for us, is that Northamptonshire and Rutland are proposed as a single Hub, which will allow us to build on the work of the last 11 years, working with our existing schools and partners to deliver exciting music education opportunities for the children of our counties. NMPAT will remain as ever, and Rutland Music will be our delivery brand for work in our neighbouring county. We will work with a range of local and national partners, including all our schools and academies to create a vibrant music education environment.
NMPAT will still have to apply to be commissioned to continue leading the Hub, but we firmly hope that we will be able to build on the success of the last decade and create further exciting opportunities and memories for our young musicians, working as one of the country’s flagship Hub Lead Organisations.
You can read more about the Arts Council Hub Investment Programme on the ACE website.
Peter Smalley
Chief Executive
