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Across the world, the arts continue to transform lives, fostering creative expression, intercultural understanding, and a vital sense of belonging for young people. Yet in many international education contexts, including the International Baccalaureate's Diploma Programme (DP), the arts remain on the periphery—optional, undervalued, and under threat.
I conducted in-depth doctoral research into this paradox. My findings reveal a landscape of enduring barriers, alongside practical, replicable strategies that can support schools and educators in championing the arts within the IB framework.
The Data: Growth Without the Arts
Between 2014 and 2024, the number of full Diploma Programme candidates worldwide grew from just over 75,000 to more than 114,000 annually, reflecting the IB's significant global expansion (IBO, 2025).
However, participation in the arts has not kept pace with this growth.
- In 2014, 23.9% of full diploma students took at least one Group 6 arts subject.
- By 2024, that figure had declined to 22.3%.
At first glance, this drop of 1.6 percentage points may appear modest. In real terms, however, it represents a significant and persistent shift. In 2024 alone, this difference equates to approximately 1,800 fewer students engaging in arts learning than would have done so had participation rates remained stable.
In other words, while the Diploma Programme has grown rapidly, the arts have not grown with it. Each year, thousands of students who might once have included an arts subject in their studies are now opting, or being guided, elsewhere.
This steady erosion highlights the complex realities of how student choice is enacted within schools. While the IB framework continues to value breadth and balance, the positioning of the arts as an optional Group 6 subject, combined with school-level factors such as timetabling structures, staffing models, and perceptions of academic or post-DP advantage, can unintentionally narrow access to arts subjects over time.
Why Are Fewer Students Choosing the Arts?
My research uncovered institutional, societal, and perceptual barriers:
The placement of the arts within Group 6 as an optional subject can, in practice, position them as secondary. University admissions pressures, particularly in STEM-heavy contexts, discourage arts study. Cultural perceptions, where the arts are dismissed as either too easy or too demanding, further complicate subject choice. Timetabling and resourcing challenges make it difficult for schools to prioritise arts subjects.
These forces combine to make the arts an increasingly difficult choice for students, particularly those pursuing competitive university pathways.
A Curriculum of Contradictions
The optionality of Group 6 was introduced by the IB in the 1970s as a flexible solution for students aiming for specialised university entry. But today, that compromise is showing its age. My research suggests that what was once a practical compromise now carries unintended systemic consequences, particularly in how the IB's holistic ideals are realised in everyday school contexts.
The DP is imagined as a balanced hexagon, but as Bunnell (2011) writes: "…the operational truth is that each subject is of slightly different size and 'value' with Group 6, in particular, being a very small element of the hexagon… even the idea of offering a 'breadth' can be questioned."
Using conflict theory (Villalobos, 2015), I explored four overlapping tensions that help explain the arts' marginalisation:
Functional conflict – Arts subjects are often the first to lose time, space, and funding.
Meaning conflict – The arts are undervalued within the academic and social hierarchy.
Positional conflict – The IB champions balance, but positions the arts as optional.
Power conflict – University entry systems heavily influence subject choices and perceptions of value.
As the IB continues to evolve through ongoing structural review, careful attention to how the status of the arts is experienced in practice will be essential to avoiding further marginalisation of a subject group that is central to developing creative, compassionate, and globally minded learners.
School-Level Change Is Possible
While curriculum reform is slow, school-level change is possible today. My study identified 36 practical strategies used by schools to boost arts uptake. These fall into five categories:
🎯 Whole-school marketing
🎓 Leadership advocacy
💬 Counselling interventions
🎭 Arts team promotional practices
🌱 Non-deliberate cultural influences such as showcases and interdisciplinary links
The most successful schools implemented a greater number of strategies in tandem, and this directly correlated with higher numbers of students participating in DP arts courses. These schools fostered a supportive ecosystem where the arts were visible, valued, and viable. Even within the constraints of the current DP structure, the evidence shows that intentional, multi-layered efforts can significantly strengthen arts uptake.
Join Me for a Research-Informed Workshop
I'll be unpacking these findings further in an upcoming ISTA professional development session designed for IB arts educators. A practical, research-informed space for IB arts educators to explore strategies they can implement within their own school contexts.
Breaking Barriers: Increasing Student Participation in IB DP Arts
📅 Saturday 17 January 2026
ISTA Online: A 90-minute workshop exploring the data, strategies, and implications of arts subject uptake in IB World Schools.
💷 ISTA Members: £50 | Non-Members: £65 (All prices in GBP)
🎓 Includes official ISTA Certificate of Attendance
🔗 Click here to register your place
Final Thoughts
I began my teaching career in a UK comprehensive school, where the drama room was often the space where students felt most at ease, where they could be themselves. Since then, I've had the chance to work on arts education at a global level, but my belief in its value has remained unchanged.
The data points to a quiet but steady decline in arts participation. But that trend isn't fixed.
What this research makes clear is that change does not rely on waiting for structural reform alone. Schools already have agency, and teachers already hold influence, particularly when they are supported with evidence, shared language, and practical strategies that reflect the realities of their contexts.
This is where ISTA sees its role. By creating space for dialogue, sharing research-informed practice, and supporting educators who are navigating these tensions on the ground, we aim to help schools protect meaningful access to the arts within the DP. The arts should not be left on the margins. They have a vital role to play at the heart of a balanced, meaningful education.
References
Bunnell, T., 2011. The growth of the IB diploma: critical perspectives on balance, depth and development. In: Hayden, M. & Thompson, J. (eds). Taking the IB Diploma Programme Forward. Woodbridge, UK: John Catt, pp.131-141.
IB., 2025. The IB Diploma Programme and Career-Related Programme May 2025 Assessment Session – Final Statistical Bulletin. Available from: https://www.ibo.org/globalassets/new-structure/about-the-ib/pdfs/dp-final-statistical-bulletin-may-2024_en.pdf.
Villalobos, C. (2015). Social conflicts in the educational field: A conceptual model for understand this problematic in contemporary societies. International Journal of Sociology of Education, 4(1), 49–68.
