What was the effect on attendance and exclusions?
There was some evidence of The Art Room’s impact in improving attendance for secondary school students; attendance was rarely raised for the primary school children. The evidence on preventing exclusions is harder to interpret, given the small numbers involved. For some, The Art Room was not enough to stop them being excluded. Teachers, however, gave examples of how The Art Room had helped some secondary school students not only avoid getting into trouble but also to re-engage with their education whether following exclusion or non-attendance.
Does The Art Room help to raise standards of attainment?
The young people’s time at The Art Room and the evaluation was too brief to make judgments on the effect on academic attainment, but the evaluation supported the teachers’ view that The Art Room helped most of the children re-engage in the classroom. This, at the very least, improves their chances of making educational progress.