Arts and Cultural Education in a Challenging and Changing World

Tanja Klepacki works as an educational scientist at the Chair of Pedagogy with a Focus on Culture and Aesthetic Education at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität (FAU) Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany, where she is also the Senior Researcher of the UNESCO Chair in Digital Culture and Arts in Education and the executive manager of the Chair’s Teacher Training Academy. Her fields of work include theoretical and empirical studies in the fields of aesthetic and cultural education, cultural transformation dynamics, cultural sustainability, and cultural resilience. Besides research and teaching, she is responsible for the management of the editorial office of the international, peer-reviewed, open access Journal for Research in Cultural, Aesthetic, and Arts Education (IJRCAAE). She is also the permanent representative of the UNESCO Chair in the Network of German UNESCO Chairs and in the European Network of Observatories in the Field of Arts and Cultural Education (ENO). Edwin van Meerkerk is professor of Cultural Education at Radboud University, Nijmegen. He publishes on this subject as well as on cultural policy and higher education for sustainability in both open-access academic journals and for the wider public. He is also endowed professor of Social and Cultural Sustainability at ArtEZ University of the Arts and Leadership fellow in the Comenius Programme for Educational Innovation. In his research and teaching, he is driven by curiosity about how people give shape to their ideas about the value of art in practice. He does this, among other things, through his long-term research into the cooperation between art teachers and teachers in primary education within the framework of the national programme Quality Cultural Education. He is also concerned with the differences between policy and practice with regard to cultural entrepreneurship. He has worked with societal partners such as Oxfam on bridging arts and cultural education with global societal challenges. Currently, he is leading a project to implement sustainability in the widest sense of the concept in all bachelor’s programmes at Radboud University. Tone Pernille Østern is professor in Arts Education with a focus on Dance at NTNU Norwegian University of Science and Technology. She also holds a position as visiting professor in Dance Education in Contemporary Contexts at Stockholm University of the Arts. She is active as artist/researcher/teacher with a special interest in participatory arts, choreographic processes, inclusive and critical pedagogies, performative research, and post-qualitative inquiry. Practice-led research, a/ r/tography and educational design research have been important approaches in her research and supervision of master and PhD students. She is project leader of the How to do things with disability research group from 2024, and international advisor of the Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland funded research and development project Scenkonst med i lærande (SMIL) (Performing arts as part of learning) (2023–2026). She is Editor-in-chief for the peer-reviewed journal Dance Articulated.

• Pedagogies of hope in times of crises: Meanings of arts education throughout the lifespan.- Interdisciplinary, a way forward for art education in higher education? – Perspectives from Ireland.- Safety, Inclusion, and Resilience.- The challenges of educational inclusion: arts education in and as alternative education in England.- Cultural Transformation as (De-)Stabilization – on the Relevance of Education for Cultural Resilience and Cultural Sustainability in the Anthropocene.- Local and Indigenous Communities.- Decolonisation from the margins: Shack Theatres and the experience of the Khayelitsha Art School & Rehabilitation Centre (KASI RC) in South Africa.- ”For some children, these can be unique experiences and first encounters with the arts. Why not strenghten them everywhere?” - Cultural Education Plans as a way of strengthening equity for the arts and culture in Finland.- Exploring local culture and traditions through art activities and play in a children’s museum.- Digitalisation.- Sustainable Arts Education in the Post-Human Age: Models and methodologies for engaging with AI and one’s humannes.- Interweaving and Linking Digital, Analogue and Outdoor Learning through Artistic Experiences in a Slovenian Primary School.