National College Creative Industries

The creative sector is an identified priority in the 2017 Government Industrial strategy. The strategy makes the point that the UK’s world-class creative industries are growing at twice the rate of the economy as a whole and are heavily reliant on STEM skills. The strategy states that: The creative industries sector, which makes up over five per cent of the UK economy and employs more than two million people, is one of the fastest growing and contributes £87bn of GVA.

The National College of Creative and Cultural Industries was the vision of Creative and Cultural Skills (CCSkills) with CEOs or senior executives from organisations including the Royal Opera House, the National Theatre, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the BBC, Whitelight, and LiveNation. – our founding employers. Together they created the national college to meet skills gaps for technical and backstage training in the creative industries

The Business plan set out the vision for the National College to ‘enable the UK’s creative and cultural industries to access the future talent and skills they need to maintain, enhance and grow the UK’s position as the global creative destination’. Following incorporation in September 2016, the College launched the pilot of the Level 4 Professional Diploma in Technical and Production Practice for Creative Industries and delivered an apprenticeship offer in backstage and offstage as well as events and cultural and heritage for the creative sector. The College currently offers Apprenticeships at level 2, level 3 nationally and there are early discussions on level 4 and 5 higher apprenticeship delivery.

The Backstage Centre at Purfleet is the home of the National College and is a purpose-built building designed to provide education and training facilities as well as accommodating major productions including live events, rehearsals, conferences and workshops. Its facilities have been made available to internationally renowned artists and acts as well as numerous theatre companies and companies making commercials. The commercial facilities and services provided at the Backstage Centre have led to invaluable opportunities for students to gain hands-on experience in a real working environment. This is integrated within their programme of study and this is distinguishing feature of the curriculum offered.

The National College is committed to supporting employers by tailoring their provision to the needs of the industry while enabling young people from diverse and non-traditional backgrounds to gain the skills to work backstage and offstage.