Creativity

Abstract

The idea of creativity generally has met with a sort of cyclical consensus in education: “Everyone likes it”, one researcher drily remarks, “[h]urrah for creativity” (Gibson, 2005, p. 1). Such irony underpins a sincere concern for the disparate and exploitative ways in which creativity is used, not least in educational contexts. As a “rising economic profit zone”, creativity’s expansion is “grotesque” as it encompasses so many disparate fields (Raunig, 2013, p. 109). It starts early, too, as children’s creative development is seen as a stage on the road to employment after school (McClellan et al., 2012). But it is also increasingly important to lifelong education, reflecting recent international and national policy, as Stéphan Vincent-Lancrin, senior analyst and project leader of the OECD’s Directorate for Education, states:

An increasing number of countries see fostering of creativity and critical thinking as the next educational challenge: traditional good grades may no longer suffice to equip the workforce with the skills needed to fuel innovation-driven economic growth.

(Vincent-Lancrin, 2013)