Education Durham

Education Durham is a school support service, part of Durham County Council’s Children and Young People’s Services. We work with schools, settings, academies and other educational institutions to ensure the highest quality opportunities and outcomes for all children and young people in County Durham and our partner organisations across the north east.  

We do this through a wide range of support for education professionals; Senior leadership support; Headteacher briefings; curriculum network meetings; bespoke school or teacher support and  conferences through a broad ranging professional development programme.

Creative Learning Offer

Education Durham provides support and challenge to schools and academies in County Durham and further afield and is part of Durham County Council’s Children and Young People’s Services.

Education Durham is dedicated to the development of teaching and learning in curriculum dance and performing arts, the service provides quality networking and professional development for teaching staff, with specialist Physical Education advisor and opportunities for young people to access a range of high-quality dance activities, both in and out of school, including open opportunities to create and perform. Annually our ‘Feetfirst’ showcase at Durham Gala Theatre, presents an evening of dance pieces to celebrate the achievements of talented and creative dancers within County Durham Secondary Schools.  Our School Sport Partnerships too, through specialist dance coaches, support the development of quality inclusive and progressive curriculum dance, and showcase the talent of Primary School pupils through the inclusive annual primary cluster dance festivals.

In addition, Education Durham actively promotes performances in schools – recently working with Elysium Theatre for the Durham Shakespeare Festival along with other groups where we can amplify or target the activities. In the past we have supported and developed resources for the Little Read in schools programme. Durham Learning Resources, based in Spennymoor has a collection of over 300,000 items that schools loan to enhance and inspire their curriculum along with professional development sessions for staff.

Early Years colleagues work with private and voluntary sector settings along with schools to enable creativity and new thinking into their practice and offer for the children under their care. A current project working with Jan Dubiel is focusing on strengthening the early years curriculum. One element is exploring learning behaviours and 21st Century skills. Those skills are identified as: Critical thinking; Creativity; Collaboration; Communication; Information literacy; Media literacy; Technology literacy; Flexibility; Leadership; Initiative; Productivity; Social skills

Find out more about Education Durham here