Across education there has been a dawning realisation that schools must bring out the “human competencies” - sometimes called “soft skills” - in young people.

Collaboration, creativity, empathy, judgement and critical thinking - all are recognised as vital for young people to cultivate. The issue, though, is schools are still judged much more on areas and subjects that are more easily assessed, standardised and ranked.

Those things matter, too, but if we really want to ensure that young people have the adaptability for the modern world, we need to find a way to give space to both.

The MAGIC-T model

At our school in Thailand, where I work as creative director, we have been doing this through a model called MAGIC-T (Museums, Art Gallery Institutions, Cultural Centres and Theatres).

Born out of a school-wide artist residency, this has become a Reggio-inspired, whole-school atelier model that has been refined over more than a decade, seeking to create the feeling of an education department of cultural centres, but within a school.

At its core is the idea of treating outside voices and creative practice not as decorative extras but as part of how learning across the school is shaped.

One recent example underlines how this can work in practice.

Working with a former associate dean of Parsons School of Design in New York and the founder of Make Art with Purpose, students explored tools and technologies across time, beginning with a simple but important question: what might ancient technologies still teach us about sustainability now?

From there, they were introduced to local materials such as bamboo and river plants, and to the idea that certain plants can help to filter impurities from the water.

They moved through design cycles using straws and small-scale prototypes before scaling those ideas up in ensemble groups of around eight students per sculpture.

As this was happening, there were discussions, breakout events, small group projects and practical tasks led by the practitioners, such as knot-tying and plant identification, alongside an ongoing effort to encourage students to take risks, swap ideas in and out, and keep iterating.

What made this work was that the practitioners did not arrive to deliver a one-off workshop and disappear. Instead, collaboration over longer time periods allows for both specific subjects to be taught and for the work to transcend into wider skills, such as collaboration and teamwork, which are so fundamental.

Ensemble work

Indeed, I think this is perhaps the biggest benefit of the approach: helping to move students beyond the more general idea of teamwork and towards something I think is more accurately called ensemble work.

Teamwork is generally role-bound and driven by a known outcome, whereas ensemble work requires negotiating difference, working through uncertainty and creating consensus with others when no single voice has all the answers.

This requires the ability to listen, negotiate, respond and create with others when the goal is not to defeat an opponent, but to build something together.

Student voice is also able to come to the fore more in these situations, so learners’ input is a serious addition to the conversation rather than a symbolic gesture.

In the water-remediation project mentioned above, the final sculptural outcomes were not built to match a predetermined example. They were shaped through the students’ own decisions, discussions and experimentation, allowing them to see that their thinking had real consequence.

When students understand that they are driving the learning and that the school takes their ideas seriously, then the school itself can begin to feel less like a system of management and more like a community shaped by the voices within it.

Getting started

It may not be realistic for all schools to set up a MAGIC-T atelier overnight, but the key is to recognise that rather than hosting one-off workshops, it’s about long-term projects, lasting perhaps for a few weeks or a whole term, to really embed core skills over time.

You could consider what passions, practices or skills educators already hold that could be used to create a project. You could also use expertise from parents, families, community members or contacts with local organisations to expand the knowledge and ideas being shared.

Schools could also offer access to space in return for support with such initiatives. Many schools do this with sports facilities, so why not theatre spaces, kitchens, design studios or other creative spaces?

Where creative practitioners see valuable space, access to technology or inspiring surroundings, they are often more than happy to explore exchange through sustained engagement with children and young people.

However or wherever a MAGIC-T model begins, it is all about the possibility of providing sustainable ways of helping our children and young people to encounter nuance and engage with a broader range of positions and perspectives.

Alex Soulsby is the creative director at Prem Tinsulanonda International School in Thailand and founder and creative director of Artist Residency Thailand