What Happened to Creative Education?
A look at where education fails and why - plus! More information on the launch and content of HatchEd’s 'Creative Futures' Kit.
It’s a strange time to be in the creative field, especially if you’re young and coming through the college / university system that’s supposed to prepare you for it. Instead of firing students up with experimentation, risk, and originality, the system seems more interested in churning out polished decks, vision documents, and AI-generated mediocrity.
Let's talk about some of the odd, counterproductive trends that are quietly sucking the life out of creative education and leaving a generation of students disengaged, risk-averse, and sadly very corporate.
Everything’s digital
There’s something deeply uninspiring about spending hours crafting a piece of art, or honing a design only to have it flattened into a PDF or flicked through on a PowerPoint slide. More and more, students are being pushed to present everything digitally. No sketchbooks, no tactile models, no rough, raw experiments that show how they got to their final outcome.
This is a big problem. Creativity isn’t linear, and the magic often happens in the mess. In the offhand sketch, the scribbled idea that leads to something unexpected. But digital submissions flatten all of that. You can’t feel the work anymore. There’s no texture, no weight, no sense of scale. You don’t get to see the process, only the sanitised result. I’ve spoken plenty about the benefits when linking the eye, brain and pencil in hand - how great thoughts and ideas can come from using all three simultaneously.
For young creatives, jumping straight on to a screen kills spontaneity. They learn to present a polished version, deleting mistakes, instead of actually living it. It becomes about ticking boxes and packaging ideas, rather than exploring them.
The UN sustainable development goals (*sigh*)
Creative students in mainstream education find their work being shoehorned into projects where they must tie back to the UN’s ‘17 Sustainable Development Goals’, as if these were handed down from on high and must be obeyed at all times.
Problem is, these goals weren’t written for creativity (or anything that’s relevant to most of us to be honest). They are political and economic frameworks built on an agenda that makes no sense, formed by an inter-governmental organisation.
All levels of mainstream education are encouraged, if not expected to add them at every possible opportunity in to the curriculum. Is this happening in education outside the UK? Possibly. Do any of these goals refer to countries in the UK specifically? No.
Why?
Well, the ‘goals’ are global for a start, which means they’re often too vague or irrelevant when it comes to specific, local contexts. What’s a ‘solution’ in Sweden isn’t necessarily applicable in India for instance. But students are being told to funnel their ideas into these frameworks anyway, often at the expense of nuance or original thought as to why. There’s no educational value at all.
Never mind the sinister ‘everyone in lockstep, no matter what’ message it sends.
Creativity thrives on asking new questions, not following a pre-approved script. If the only acceptable creative work is that which fits neatly under SDG 8 or 13, or whatever, then students learn to make the work conform to authority and the state, instead of challenging the world as it actually is. That’s not education. That’s communism.
Wrapping students in cotton wool
Here’s a radical thought. Maybe students should be allowed to mess up!
We’ve just finished setting up our student’s degree show. An exhibition of their work. It was so tightly curated - with staff intervening the whole time - that students probably felt a lack of ownership by the end of it.
Creative education is becoming more and more about hand-holding. Protecting reputations. Students at university, aged eighteen and above, are getting their ideas pre-chewed for them.
Feedback is constant. Projects are micromanaged. Failure is treated like a disaster instead of a step forward.
Creativity needs risk. You don’t grow by being told the right answer. You grow by testing things, failing, and figuring out how to do better next time. The current trend turns universities into safety nets instead of launch pads. And it creates graduates who can just about meet a deadline but can’t deal with uncertainty, which is the one thing that defines every creative career.
“Students at university – are getting their ideas pre-chewed for them.”
We don’t need students who only follow instructions well. We need thinkers, entrepreneurs, zig-zaggers. We need students who fall over, brush themselves off, then come bouncing back with something unusual and brilliant. But that won’t happen if we’re too scared to let them fall in the first place.
The AI Kool-Aid: Everyone’s drinking it, but is anyone thinking about it?
AI is the shiny new toy, and education can’t stop waving it around. Universities are teaching workshops and holding seminars on it like it’s the second coming of creativity.
Except it’s not.
AI makes people lazier. AI kills creativity. AI is already eating into the job market that students are supposed to be entering. Illustration jobs, copywriting gigs, design roles are being outsourced to generative algorithms. Resulting in awful, identical designs, and linear-thinking. Yet students are being told that AI is their new best friend. Even to the point of using AI for counselling!
The logic doesn’t add up.
Young people need to be steered in to creative ways of thinking, lateral solutions, and smart problem solving. Instead, they are encouraged to rely on technology to find the answers.
“Creativity isn’t linear, and the magic often happens in the mess. In the offhand sketch, the scribbled idea that leads to something unexpected”.
Worse still, is the hypocrisy of most universities pushing a ‘green / net zero’ policy (remember those UN ‘goals’?) - but brushing aside one of the worst offenders (based on their own views).
AI uses up a lot of power! Duh! Training and running large language or image models takes a staggering amount of energy. So while we’re forcing students to frame every project around sustainability goals, we’re also encouraging them to rely on tools that are, by their own rules, ‘environmentally unsound’.
It’s hypocritical. It’s confusing. It sends an odd message. Sshh - don’t worry about critical thinking, and double standards - just let the machine do it.
What now?
If we really care about creative education, we need to stop treating it like a corporate training program. Students need space and time to explore, mess up, build things with their hands, ask the silly questions, and find their voice without having to justify every decision with a UN goal or an algorithm.
Let’s bring back the mess. The chaos. The risk. Because that’s where real creativity lives. Not in the presentation deck, not in the AI prompt, and definitely not in the fear of getting it wrong.
Want to take it further?
Help your creative teen build a future - without mainstream further education.
Proper design training and mentorship for teens. Led by an industry professional who’s helped hundreds of students find creative jobs.
I’ve built a practical, down-to-earth toolkit just for teens like yours (and parents like you).
It’s called the Creative Futures Kit, launches Thursday 12th June, and includes:
3 short, easy-to-follow creative modules
Real design tasks and challenges
A Career Map
Access to creative check-in sessions with occasional guest industry tailored to your teen’s skills.
Plus access to all the content published on Hatched including the archive, other creative toolkits, and podcasts.
They’ll:
Learn how professional creatives think and work
Build their first “mini brand” and portfolio
Use free industry approved tools
What You’ll Get
The kit guides parents who want to give their creative teens a leg up in design, even if they’re not going down the traditional route. Each week will build on knowledge gained with additional tips, advice and projects.
I’ll be sharing:
Practical creative challenges teens can do at home
Straight-talking advice on design careers
Free and affordable tools to build real skills
Support for parents who want to guide their teens
Module 1: ‘Think Like a Creative - the basics of design’
Module 2: ‘Industry Tools and Which to Use’
Module 3: ‘Build a Killer Mini Brand and Folio’
BONUS: The Creative Career Map - how to get your work seen
Who is this kit for?
This kit is ideal for:
Creative teens (although also open to younger and older creatives too!)
Parents seeking to support their teen's creative interests
Educators looking for engaging resources to inspire students
No prior experience is necessary. The kit is designed to be accessible and beginner-friendly.
Click subscribe to get it straight to your inbox on Thursday 12th June
(current subscribers and those who subscribe before May 31st will receive an early preview of the content)
Thanks for reading, always appreciated. Let’s make creativity something your teen can build a future with.
See you back here next week! 😊
“The unique blend of passion, practical experience, and mentorship makes the HatchEd tutor an exceptional educator. I admire her commitment to empowering young minds to excel in the world. Without a shadow of a doubt, I wholeheartedly recommend HatchEd to anyone seeking not only an exceptional teacher but also a mentor who deeply cares about the success of their students. She's truly outstanding."
Rona Marin-Miller, Designer and Parent.