University News Last updated 28 February
Get to know who is driving BCU's Associate Faculty, Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, in this regular feature, Meet the RBC leadership team.
Head of Learning and Participation Associate Professor Richard Shrewsbury is an RBC alumnus who trains and supports music and creative arts students to take their practice and use it for social impact.
What are the core skills or areas of expertise that you bring to RBC?
My area of expertise is music and performing arts in education and community contexts. I train and support music and creative arts students to take their practice and use it for social impact. I was a creative curriculum advisor for primary, secondary and Special Educational Needs (SEN) schools in the Black Country before coming back to work at BCU after graduating.
Through my knowledge of school improvement and management, I have developed an integrated schools programme for the benefit of all our students and staff, including the new RBC Primary School of Music in Small Heath, Birmingham.
Since graduating back in the late 90s, I have held various positions as a classroom Music Teacher, Peripatetic Instrumental Teacher, Curriculum Advisor, Project Manager, Creative Practitioner and Managing Director of a Music Education company. My knowledge of music and creative arts pedagogy contributes to the huge pool of skills and knowledge of staff at RBC and maintains RBC as one of the most sought-after Conservatoires to study at.
What have been your highlights since you started at RBC?
There have been many individual highlights through our learning and participation programme, from interactive concerts for 2,500 children that will be remembered for years, to the flash mobbing of primary school classrooms by our music students without the teachers knowing!
Two initiatives that I have launched and that I am most proud of are SoundLab and RBC St Benedict's Primary School of Music in Small Heath.
SoundLab, our RBC centre for creative music-making, has been going for eight years in Coventry, Birmingham and now in Stockholm. It has positively impacted on the lives of over a 1,000 young people aged between 13 and 18 from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds.
RBC St Benedict’s Primary School of Music recently opened in Small Heath, an area of the city with significant economic and cultural barriers to participation. The addition of an RBC Primary School of Music allows RBC students the opportunity to try out their pedagogical skills in a supportive environment and brings in music specialist skills for the benefit of the 360 children at the school. The aim is to provide a sustainable model for primary school music education that can be replicated in any primary school in the UK by training class teachers and team teaching in the classroom.
What have been the most challenging issues that you’ve had to discuss and take a view on so far?
RBC already has a more integrated suite of pedagogy, community engagement and music for social purpose modules than any other UK Conservatoire for the benefit of our students.
The challenge is how to make this even more core to the courses and activities across music and acting as we move forward, then how best to make sure this unique selling point of coming to study at RBC gets promoted externally. The narrative has changed a lot at RBC from performance skills and pedagogical skills being two different sets of skills, to being one set of skills that are essential to the successful careers of our graduates.
RBC is known for its amazing support and nurture of the most creative young musicians, actors and stage managers. Over time, we are managing to diversify our intake by extending our learning and participation work across the UK. I would love to find more sustainable ways of providing pathways into the Conservatoire, encouraging even more young people from diverse backgrounds to come and study with us, the key being collaboration and partnerships with the broader music and arts education sector.
What do you do outside of the role when you are not working?
Even though I work in music day in day out, I enjoy composing music for a range of dance projects. I love working with technology and have a small studio set up at home. I have two teenage daughters, and I love supporting them with their own interests – psychology and conservation! My wife and I enjoy exploring new places, especially in and around the Black Country and to the west of Birmingham.