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Foreword
Stuart Worden
Principal
The BRIT School is a good news story for this country . It ’ s a good news story for the education world , the arts world and the economics of the world . Lessons can be learnt from its success and they are profoundly made clear in this report we commissioned for our 30th year , through which - for the first time - we invited our 10,000 alumni to share their experiences and their stories of change . The BRIT School has transformed the lives of the young people who have studied and nurtured their craft here , as well as the arts areas that they now work in .
At the heart of The BRIT School is a simple idea : that an arts education should be free and available to all , regardless of their economic or social circumstances .
One of the most rewarding things about working at The BRIT School is watching how a young person ’ s life can be transformed by it . The BRIT School matters because it transforms . Some of this is skill : “ I didn ’ t realise I could be a film director .” “ I didn ’ t think that I would fall in love with ballet .” “ I never thought I could write a play .” “ No one had told me that I could be a fashion designer .” “ I had no idea I could be a sound engineer .” Even the great Adele said “ I ’ d never written a song before I went to The BRIT School .”
I remember once being told by an actor who is now on our TV screens all the time , “ It wasn ’ t until I came to The BRIT School that I had ever heard of the phrase Drama School ’. My world , my school , never used that phrase . Maybe they thought it wasn ’ t for people like me .”
Yet The BRIT School transforms its students with more than skill , more than opportunityit transforms them as people . The singersongwriter Natalie Stewart , one half of the band Floetry , who have sold well over 1m records , and collaborated with Jill Scott and Queen Latifah , among others , said : “ You can tell a BRIT School student . It ’ s in their eyes . It ’ s in how they walk .”