Gold is the highest level of Arts Award, giving young people insight into life as an arts professional. They'll hone their existing artistic skills, acquire new ones, gain practical experience of different roles in the arts world and develop leadership expertise. Worth 16 UCAS points, it's also a great boost to university and job applications.
Gold Arts Award is a young person-led qualification that encourages creativity and independent learning. It challenges young people to develop their arts practice, lead an arts project, investigate topical arts issues and get involved in the arts world.
Along the way, they create a portfolio showcasing their new-found knowledge alongside their critical-thinking, organisational, problem-solving, collaboration, communication and management skills.
Completing the award gives young people a foothold in the creative industries and skills for life – whatever their future holds. We've made a short video so you can see for yourself.
Arts Award Gold from Arts Award on Vimeo
To achieve Gold Arts Award, learners create a portfolio, in a format of their choice, presenting evidence that they have successfully completed the two units:
Unit 1: Personal arts development
● extending their arts practice, experiencing another art form and creating new work
● actively exploring the arts world through placements, volunteering, training and research
● reviewing arts events and researching artists or craftspeople and their careers
● researching and making the case for an arts issue
Unit 2: Leadership of an arts project
● planning a project, identifying aims and outcomes
● organising people and resources
● delivering the project – including a public showing – and managing its effectiveness
● reviewing their leadership development, including collecting and evaluating feedback from participants, audience members and more
Gold Arts Award is designed for ages 16 and above, and open to anyone aged 11 to 25. It's a Level 3 qualification on the Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF) and typically takes 90 guided learning hours plus 60 independent learning hours to complete (150 hours total qualification time). Read the Gold qualification specification.
Thinking of delivering Gold Arts Award? Explore what Gold adviser training covers – the course you’ll need to complete before getting started.