Museum trips don’t improve exam results. So what?

I can remember the sounds and smells of a school trip like it was yesterday; the crackling of crisp packets opening on the bus, despite being hours off lunchtime; the stench of suncream, smothered on by parents; head counts shouted out by teachers cutting through the excitable shouts and laughter of a group of unruly schoolchildren, swapping the classroom for the real world for the day.

I was fortunate enough to attend a school where school trips were semi-regular, particularly if you studied drama (as I did). After school, we’d head to a local theatre, change out of uniform and arm ourselves with snacks to sneak in and wads of paper to try and makes notes on in the darkness. Afterwards, on the coach home, we’d discuss what we liked about it, how the performance varied from our readings of the play and the acting we wanted to mimic in our practicals.

Museums were another favourite destination for a school trip, partially for the experience of spending a couple of pounds in the gift shop at the end, but also for the endless choice of things to look at and learn about. It was on trips like this where our personalities began to truly take shape, learning what we find interesting and what we find boring, away from the pressure of choosing “good” academic subjects or the peer pressure to take the same classes as friends.

At the weekend, The Guardian published the findings of a study due to appear in the British Journal of Sociology, headlined: “Museum visits do not improve GCSE results”. The study outlines how middle-class activities, such as trips to museums, galleries or the theatre, do not correlate with higher grades (specifically GCSE grades).

The authors, from the Universities of Sussex and Edinburgh, conducted the study in response to new Ofsted guidance that schools should be assessed by both quality of education and provision of “cultural capital”, to ensure wealthier students were not unfairly advantaged in their schooling.

“It is beguiling to believe that increasing pupils’ levels of cultural capital will have a positive influence on school GCSE outcomes,” the authors write. “It is tempting to theorise that visits to museums or historic venues might be helpful in igniting interests in history, and that visits to the theatre might similarly cultivate learning in drama. On deeper reflection, it is difficult to plausibly describe mechanisms by which the exposure to certain extracurricular activities would influence outcomes in other school GCSE subjects.” 

By reducing cultural enjoyment or exposure down to a statistical outcome based on textbook learning, the study misunderstands the point of culture and its long-lasting impact. School trips contextualise things learnt in the classroom by showing them in the real world; preparing children for the future when subjects become industries and interests. Arguably, this kind of life experience is more valuable than a high grade — living in London I regularly visit galleries for a calming reprieve from the hustle and bustle of the city, but I can’t remember the last time someone asked what I got in my GCSE’s. 

The study admits that cultural school trips still have value in their contribution to “educational enjoyment”, but argues these experiences do nothing to reduce the size of social class inequalities in school GCSE outcomes. This may well be true regarding exam results, but if a child cannot afford to take to go to the theatre or a gallery, schools must be the place where children are introduced to the different spheres of culture; I struggle to believe a child with top GCSE results who has never set foot in a museum or gallery would consider themselves more advantaged than someone who has.

And if Ofsted must consider cultural school trips through the gaze of benefit to exam results, then surely the take away from this study should not demean the importance of culture, but provoke critical analysis of our education system instead. Here is evidence that something is wrong with the memorise-a-textbook system in place if exposure to the subject in real life fails to increase enthusiasm or understanding upon return to school.

As adults in the digital age we have become obsessed with productivity and “self-optimisation”, but schoolchildren are not living for their next LinkedIn update or thinking about much else than the pains of growing up — such is the beauty of childhood. Cultural enjoyment cannot be measured by data, nor should it be. Theatre, art and history are intended to broaden the imagination and, at the very least, give children a break from the monotony of classes and exams and get them off their mobile phones. 

Culture exists outside of our data-driven world, or at least I would like it to. Encouraging children to value every experience in accordance to how it might benefit their academic achievement will result in a cohort of very sad, stressed and unsatisfied students; the last thing they need post-pandemic. There is no better time than childhood to teach young people to enjoy art for art’s sake.