78%** of people in the UK agree that creativity is key to driving economic growth. And although 61%** feel that creativity is ‘stifled’ by the current education system, they do agree that more needs to be done to foster it. My fear for an education system devoid of any arts tuition, is that creativity will be stifled even further.

The key will be technology, which when used effectively, will need to play an increasingly central role in helping schools to drive creativity and support arts subjects. We work with schools, such as Chalfonts Community College, who have created Digital Art courses that blend virtual and reusable learning resources. This involved rewriting the traditional art specification to include digital media – from digital imaging, film, animation, graphics and game making – to help students learn creative skills which influence their approach across the curriculum.

The UK is renowned for its creativity thanks to its successes in fashion, art, design, film, food and music, so creative schooling is incredibly important. We have the best creative higher education system of any country in the world, but cutting arts from secondary education I fear will create a skills gap between school and higher education or the workplace in years to come.”

*Taken from Adobe’s ‘Creativity in the Classroom’ report, 2010
**Taken from Adobe’s ‘State of Create’ report, 2012

What do these tools mean for the education community? The debate around the teaching of computer science in our schools, Universities and colleges has never been hotter and these new tools are a great way for you and your students to create media rich web content and apps across a raft of devices and Web browsers. And the best bit… they are completely free for students and teachers!

One of the tools, Adobe Edge Animate 1.0, is a fantastic way to help your students learn the ins and outs of interactive design and animation. It’s really easy to use, so they can quickly move from “sketch-to-prototype” using the same tools and methods used by the professionals, which puts them in a great position when they start looking for jobs!

First up is the latest version of our consumer photo and video-editing software, Photoshop Elements 11 and Premiere Elements 11. Elements is a consumer-friendly version of our professional imaging and video products, Photoshop and Premiere Pro. There are tons of new tools, including the option to apply creative filters to photos and Hollywood movie style ‘FilmLooks’ to transform videos. The Student and Teacher bundle is available from £72.27 (ex VAT).

Earlier this month we launched Acrobat XI which you can use in the following ways:

• Create electronic portfolios
• Use Acrobat as a digital assessment tool
• Create lesson plan templates with Acrobat forms
• Streamline administrative productivity through features like Actions, FormCentral, document security, and signature processing

To find out more about you how you can use Acrobat in your university we have created free updated guides for using Adobe Acrobat XI on the Adobe Education Exchange.

For less than 60p a day, you and your students can download and install every Adobe Creative Suite desktop application, access 20GB of cloud-based storage, and get upgrades to new versions and services as soon as they’re released. Create awesome websites, portfolios and projects – share, collaborate and publish – anytime, anywhere, and in any direction your or your student’s imagination takes you.

To find out more about the features and benefits of the Adobe Creative Cloud and this great offer click here. But hurry. You and your students can have it all with an Adobe Creative Cloud membership at just £15.88 a month. But only if you join before 4 November 2012.

We’re experiencing the most radical changes to the Higher Education sector in decades. The student experience will naturally evolve as a result – but it’s important that undergraduates who are starting their University careers this Autumn feel it is changing for the better. As well as judging value for money on factors such as teaching hours and future job prospects, our own research* tells us that students are scrutinising access to support facilities such as libraries (60%) and the provision of more than just basic ICT so they can develop the ‘essential’ skills needed for the workplace.

We welcome this fresh approach to supporting students in navigating the new obstacles they face in choosing a University. But for it to have real impact, University Vice Chancellors must ensure they’re in a position to be able to meet the demands of the next generation of student, particularly with regard to the provision of industry standard technology which many young people consider to be instrumental in helping them secure employment later on. Needless to say, those able to adapt their strategies will be far more appealing to students looking for reassurances that they’ll have more than just debt to show for their University careers.

*Adobe Digital Campus report, September 2012

It contains a bunch of videos teaching everything from creating a personal brand, to packaging up work into portfolios for PDF, the Web, print and the iPad.

You can check all these out for yourself by clicking here.

Ian told me that an impressive 94% of Coventry University’s graduates go on to employment or further study, which is a fantastic number considering the competition out there. He also mentioned a range of initiatives the University has set up to help make students more employable.

First up, the University has created links with a range of businesses enabling students to take on work placements and summer internships, part of which involves students being set live briefs which gives them real-world experience before leaving university. It has also set up a scheme called Add+vantage, a range of courses and initiatives to help equip students with valuable employability skills. Students can do anything from volunteering, to taking a course in leadership, right through to learning a new language or how to use digital tools such as Adobe Photoshop. What a great way to boost their CV’s and job prospects!

With the topic we’ve all been talking about for the last year soon set to become a reality, the increase in tuition fees, Coventry University is also introducing four pay-bands across its degree courses to reflect the level of teaching and facilities that students will have access to. In some of the more vocational degrees, such as Media & Communications, students will receive free Macbook Pro laptops with Adobe software pre-installed which will help students develop industry standard skills!

Is your university helping students to find employment through creative initiatives? If so, we’d love to hear from you!

Students are specifically scrutinising access to support facilities such as libraries, a ‘digital campus’ with industry-standard technology and well-qualified and accessible tutors as key factors when they’re judging the value for money offered by a University.  

As a result, we are calling on Vice Chancellors to review their ICT strategies to better support students and lecturers.

Click on the infographic below to see all the key findings in detail:

Check out the full report here which also includes different industry perspectives from the Vice Chancellor at Coventry University, as well as lecturers at Met Film School, Norwich University College of the Arts and Harrow College.

To support institutions in meeting this demand, we’ve launched a new three year license agreement, the Eduserv Adobe ELA Framework Agreement. It means that both Further Education and Higher Education institutions will be able to provide access to Adobe’s latest Creative Suite software across the whole campus for the first time. Plus staff get it too!

We’re working with loads of leading institutions to help them deliver a strong digital offering. Here’s what a few have to say about the Eduserv Adobe ELA Framework Agreement:

 Kirk Laws-Chapman, Resources Manager, Norwich University College of the Arts:

“The new Eduserv Adobe ELA Framework Agreement has provided Norwich University College of the Arts with an affordable way to give our students access to latest industry standard software across the campus. Meeting expectations against a background of rising tuition fees is a challenge, and this is a great way for us to add value to the student experience here.”

Phil Purves – Senior Lecturer, Bath Spa University:

“I’m confident that a lot of current and future students will benefit the new Eduserv Adobe ELA Framework Agreement. In addition to saving the University money, it is giving us software consistency everywhere with the latest CS6 suite available on whatever machine is capable of running it. All our creative areas have been keen to support this new agreement. It’s going to make a huge difference.”

Steve Harvey, Arts University College at Bournemouth:

“The Arts University College at Bournemouth (AUCB) feels extremely privileged to be signed up to the Eduserv Adobe ELA Framework Agreement. It enables us to offer more access to industry standard software at a good price, but also helps with the strategic development of software maintenance to align Education and Business application deployment.”

 For more information on how to sign up to the agreement, check out www.eduserv.org.uk/ela. To be included in the next entry point in November 2012, institutions must complete all paperwork by 24^th October.

On Tuesday 2^nd October, we will be hosting Create the Web London, a free one-day event where we’ll be demonstrating all the latest web design tools and techniques.

For anyone that attends, it’s a great opportunity to learn all there is to know about how to create content for the Web of 2012, including HTML, CSS, motion graphics, web development and more. We’ll also show you how Adobe is helping to evolve the Web and you’ll get a sneak peak at some of the new technologies and services we’re working on for web designers and developers!

Spaces are filling up fast, so to confirm your attendance and find out more about what’s happening on the day click here .

You can also follow the conversation on Twitter with #CreateTheWeb.

Look forward to seeing you there!