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ISTA Encore has just been named a finalist in the 2026 Education Resource Awards (ERA), one of the UK’s longest-running awards recognising excellence in educational resources and practice.
Now in their 28th year, the ERA recognise the quality and impact of products, platforms, and people across the education sector. They’re widely seen as a benchmark for excellence by the teaching profession. Encore has been shortlisted in a category recognising innovative digital resources that support teaching and learning in practical, meaningful ways. Being shortlisted alongside such a wide range of organisations is significant for arts learning within the wider education landscape.
For us, this recognition matters because arts learning doesn’t always sit at the centre of conversations around digital innovation in education. Much of what happens in arts classrooms is practical, embodied, and often difficult to capture, which makes it harder to translate into digital spaces in a meaningful way.
Encore is ISTA’s on-demand online arts learning platform, designed as a practical tool for educators and students. What makes it different is the depth of each course. It’s not just a collection of videos, but a guided learning journey that moves from introduction through to practical application, combining modules, demonstrations, and classroom-ready resources.
This short trailer from the Peter Brook course offers a glimpse into how Encore learning is structured and experienced in practice.
Each course brings together artistic insight, cultural and historical context, and classroom relevance. Learning is led by experienced artists and educators who, alongside young people, demonstrate their practice rather than simply describe it. This creates space for viewers to explore alongside them, pausing, revisiting, and trying things out in their own time.
In some courses, that means exploring theatre traditions like Balinese Kecak and Topeng in their original context, filmed in Bali with the practitioners who live and breathe the work. Their teaching is shared directly, alongside classroom-based exploration where students work through the same techniques, allowing viewers to follow, pause, and explore alongside them. Live performances bring these forms to life, grounding the learning in real practice rather than interpretation.
Courses range from IB Theatre and Film subject reports to practitioners like Peter Brook and theatre traditions such as Commedia dell’Arte and Victorian Melodrama, all grounded in practical classroom use.
As Encore continues to grow, this recognition reinforces the value of creating learning experiences that are not only accessible but deeply connected to real artistic practice.
