Education is Nourishment for Society

At both the national and the European level, the issues revolving around the participation of various groups in society have been rediscovered by educational and cultural policy. In view of current demographic changes, active participation in societal processes, above all by those who traditionally have been excluded from these processes, is gaining increasing significance.

Equal access to education is a priority within the EU. In connection with the objective of developing “knowledge societies”, access to education is increasingly being considered a prerequisite for global competitiveness – as well as for winning the battle against poverty and creating social cohesion.
Particularly in increasingly heterogeneous societies, education systems have to react flexibly to the different starting positions of pupils as far as learning is concerned. This means developing new teaching and learning models and, through greater penetrability in the education system, facilitating a variety of educational paths and accesses. “Education for all” is thus one of the fundamental challenges to be met in developing our education systems. For this reason, KKA will be focussing even more strongly on international cooperation and exchange of experience in this respect in its future cooperation with partner countries.

In this context, cultural education can generate access to participation in society and plays an important role in the way we deal with diversity. KKA is seeking answers to the question of how to enable as many social groups as possible to participate actively in and have an impact on art and culture, and in the past years has developed a variety of projects devoted to giving seniors and migrants access to cultural education. Starting in 2010, its activities will focus more intensively on promoting the active participation of schoolgoers and apprentices in art and culture. In this respect, participative artistic and cultural education has always been a fundamental approach of this organisation. Artists and other persons involved in the cultural sphere have been working with children, young people and apprentices in the school context. In the future, this focus will be augmented by an intensive initiative of the Federal Ministry of Education, the Arts and Culture providing free admission to state museums for all young people up to the age of 19 as well as special programmes offered by the museums for and with the schools. The Ministry has asked KKA to coordinate this cultural education initiative.

In addition, KKA’s three Artist-in-Residence programmes, with their regional focus on Eastern and South Eastern Europe, emphasise how important it is – or, in fact, make it possible – to include more groups with migration backgrounds in cultural processes and to initiate intercultural dialogue. Learning to value one’s own culture and cultural origins is just as important as opening up to other cultures. Many cultural associations act in a very closed way, are bound to the traditional cultivation of their folklore and very seldom engage in – and possibly are not interested in – outside communication and cultural exchange. The opportunity to meet with young artists and authors can initiate dialogue that will lead to opening as well as to self-reflection and trigger learning processes that are necessary for successful integration.