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Research in Arts Education

Research in Arts Education places (artistic) research at the centre of higher arts education. This focus area develops sustainable and circular approaches to research education, equipping students and educators with the skills to respond critically, creatively, and resiliently to complex societal challenges. FRAME serves as the umbrella project, complemented by a range of smaller research initiatives carried out by lecturer-researchers within the professorship.

Building a research framework

The focus area Research in Arts Education explores how research can be meaningfully embedded in our programmes. It responds to the urgent need for stronger research competencies within the arts curricula, so that students are better equipped to engage critically, creatively, and sustainably with complex societal challenges and a rapidly changing professional field.

The umbrella project within this focus area is FRAME: Framework for Research Methods and Skills in Arts Education, led by lector Fabiola Camuti. Awarded a Comenius Leadership Fellowship (NRO), this 42-month project develops and implements a comprehensive framework for teaching, learning, and evaluating research skills across HKU.

Artistic research and educational innovation

Artistic research often requires the creation of unique methodologies that evolve during the research process itself. This makes it both a powerful and a challenging dimension of arts education. Through this focus area, the professorship investigates how to translate this complexity into applicable research skills for students, while honouring the reflective and experimental nature of artistic inquiry.

Next to FRAME, lecturer-researchers connected to the professorship carry out related projects that experiment with pedagogical and didactical approaches to research skills and methodologies. Together, these projects contribute to the national dialogue on embedding research in arts education, as highlighted by the KUO working group of the Vereniging Hogescholen. By reinforcing the position of research not only in research units but also within curricula and professional profiles, this focus area fosters a culture where inquiry, critical thinking, and methodological experimentation are integral to creative education.

Sustainable learning ecosystems

The focus area aims at developing research education as a sustainable and circular system. This means creating resilient learning structures that adapt over time, equip students with transferable skills, and prepare them for lifelong learning. Sustainability here refers not only to environmental awareness but also to educational ecosystems that can renew themselves, enabling graduates to innovate and respond to new challenges. By connecting FRAME with related lecturer-researcher initiatives, Research in Arts Education works toward a broader educational culture: one that strengthens research skills, explores creative and transdisciplinary methodologies, and positions HKU itself as a learning organisation that continues to evolve in response to new educational and societal demands.