‘By Sammy Gecsoyler/ANW
November 20, 2025
LONDON –
In an era where algorithms generate masterpieces in seconds and STEM subjects hog the spotlight, the humble art teacher is fighting for survival.
A stark 27% drop in art educators in England’s state secondary schools since 2011 has left classrooms echoing with empty easels, while GCSE arts enrollments have plummeted 48% over the past decade.
Critics decry a system that starves the soul of education, prioritizing code over canvas. Yet amid the gloom, two art teachers – one a seasoned veteran of 27 years, the other a fresh-faced millennial – share tales of resilience, heartbreak, and the unyielding spark of human creativity.
Sue Cabourn, 64, from the Isle of Man, remembers the golden days. “Around 2006 or 2007, it felt like the arts were thriving,” she recalls, her voice tinged with nostalgia during a recent interview.
Back then, budgets flowed freely: schools hired dedicated technicians, stocked studios with premium supplies, and whisked pupils on transformative trips.
Cabourn’s fondest memories aren’t just of masterpieces viewed, but of the magic in the mundane. A train ride to London’s galleries became a portal for inner-city kids who’d never left their neighborhoods. “They’d press their faces to the windows, eyes wide,” she says.
Paris beckoned too, with the Louvre’s Mona Lisa a distant dream made real. And at Yorkshire Sculpture Park? “They could touch, climb, run wild – it wasn’t just art; it was freedom.”
Those halcyon days are relics now. Funding slashes – over 50% per capita in council arts spending since 2010, per the Campaign for the Arts – have gutted programs.
Pottery kilns gather dust; 3D projects are luxuries few can afford. Technicians? A rarity. Cabourn, semi-retired after two decades in Nottingham, now covers classes sporadically.
“It’s results-driven madness,” she laments. Sketchbooks, once playgrounds of imagination, are now straitjackets of assessment.
Post-Covid remote learning twisted the knife: how do you teach texture through a screen? “Clay in your hands – that’s where the wonder happens,” she insists, citing Afghan refugees whose intricate textiles bridged language barriers 15 years ago.
Enter Jasmine Pert, 29, a beacon of optimism on Scotland’s east coast. Fresh from lockdown-era training, she’s in her fourth year, helming a secondary school studio blessed with a clay facility and dedicated space – perks not every colleague envies.
“I dreamed of this since I was 14,” Pert laughs, debunking her teenage fantasy of “sipping coffee to Radio 2 all day.”
Reality bites harder: admin mountains bury the joy, from endless spreadsheets to equity-proofing trips that not all families can fund.
Still, she pushes boundaries. “Digital art is exploding,” she notes, praising Pinterest for instant inspiration and YouTube tutorials for self-starters.
Her students, though, arrive underprepared – pencils gripped like foreign objects, rulers a mystery. “Covid widened the gaps,” she says. “We’re reteaching basics: how to hold scissors, blend watercolors without drowning the page.”
Technology’s double-edged sword cuts deepest with AI. Pert calls it “scary territory,” a disruptor churning out polished children’s books sans soul. “It’s throwaway – no handcrafted grit.” Cabourn, less tech-savvy, shudders at the implications.
“How do you know a submission’s theirs? Parents helping was bad enough; now it’s bots.” She once mourned a Year 11 class glued to Google, blind to the tactile allure of library art tomes.
“They couldn’t navigate an index – everything’s instant now.” Behavior has shifted too: phones fragment focus, homework evaporates, and basics erode.
“Kids are lazier post-Covid,” Cabourn admits bluntly, recalling a Year 10 boy baffled by dry watercolors. Pert nods, spotting fewer “analogue hobbies” amid the scroll.
Yet for these women, the heart of teaching beats in the outliers – the students with additional needs who bloom under art’s gentle gaze.
Cabourn’s special needs tenure in Nottingham was revelatory. “Autistic kids, complex cases – art was their lifeline,”
she says. One boy, entranced by blue paint, slathered it from canvas to skin in ecstatic exploration. “I let him; it was texture, color, pure sensory joy.”
Pert echoes this, adapting crafts for dexterity-challenged pupils. “It’s rewarding, finding their voice when words fail.” In a class of six with extra support, she fosters safety: “Expression without judgment – that’s the gift.”
Success stories sustain them. Cabourn treasures a shoebox of thank-you cards, lifelines on brutal Fridays when crayons flew like projectiles.
“One’s an award-winning filmmaker; another’s at a top agency. That validation? Priceless.”
Pert, from diverse schools, champions working-class roots – think Grayson Perry or Tracey Emin. “Curiosity must be funded, protected. When a kid enters a local contest post-graduation, it reignites the fire.”
For Pert, the role exceeds girlish dreams, though mentors warned of the “everything else” – the unseen toil. “Teaching’s instinctive; the rest drains.” Cabourn, imparting wisdom, urges defiance: “Art’s as vital as STEM.
We perceive the world deeper – don’t doubt your worth.” To the disengaged child? “It’s not you; life’s storms rage. Impact that one hour? You’re golden.”
As England grapples with this crisis, voices like theirs amplify a clarion call. The EBacc curriculum, critics argue, sidelines arts for “essentials,” birthing a creativity deficit.
State-educated icons like Hirst or Emin might never emerge from today’s barren soil. Cabourn and Pert, poles apart in experience, unite in fervor: art isn’t fluff; it’s the thread weaving empathy, innovation, resilience.
In a world automating wonder, these teachers remind us: true creation demands messy hands, not mouse clicks. Will policymakers heed? Or will the next Mona Lisa sketch in shadows? For now, in coastal studios and island cover shifts, the palette endures – vibrant, defiant, human.