Unlocking potential through music

What if a music classroom had no instruments? Unthinkable right? Actually, this has been the reality for school music departments in some of the most deprived areas of the UK. And it was the case for a music department I once visited, where the music teacher was ingenious enough to teach rhythm to his pupils with only a pen.

This experience made me realise that many schools in underserved areas have similarly inadequate access to musical instruments and equipment. The music education I enjoyed as a young person, has today become a privilege and not a right.

Decades of austerity have widened the attainment gap for children in state schools in our most deprived communities. Even the most committed school leadership teams struggle to resource music departments with sufficient, durable instruments to serve many hundreds of students.

A decade of achievement

In little over ten years since its foundation, Restore the Music (RTM) has equipped more than 160 music departments in primary and secondary schools in London, Birmingham, Manchester and Newcastle. That’s 150,000 kids in the most deprived areas of our country who now have a chance at a music education and, by extension, opportunities to make positive choices.

Attendance is up in RTM schools. And so is overall academic attainment. Kids are so engaged by their music lessons that they’ve started showing up for maths and English too. 

Getting kids into school and making them happy gets them to a place where they can learn and where potential becomes unlocked. Our approach is laser focused, pinpointing the schools who need it most, those with high levels of food poverty, those with more than 50% of students on free school meals.

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Polly Stepan with students from Harris Greenwich Academy at Restore the Music Gala 2025. Photo: Phoebe Rolls

The Harris Academy Greenwich was one of the first schools to benefit from RTM’s transformational support five years ago. Across this period, we have seen the arc of the positive impact from RTM funding. This year, they have no less than eight students entered for A-level music. This is far more than many private schools and way above the national average of one or two students per school.

Gladesmore Community School in Tottenham has a staggering 52 students in Year 10 studying for GCSE Music this year, which has to be a record. This level of take-up stands in stark contrast with most state schools, where there has been a 42% decline in teaching and take-up of music at GCSE since 2010. There is no doubt from our data that RTM schools are massively bucking the trend.   

First step on a pathway out of poverty

Many research studies have shown the myriad benefits of a music education, such as vital aspects of brain development.  A well-resourced music department can be the ‘rehabilitation unit’ for many kids with challenges that other departments simply fail to engage with. This might be a child who is non-verbal, has ADHD, autism, or emotional/mental health needs, displays repeated violent behaviour, or is experiencing safeguarding issues and so on. A creative education is also the first step on a pathway out of poverty.

At RTM we have found a simple solution that creates wider impact for each school we support, as a direct result of scaling up the music provision. RTM is a social impact project with a mission to ignite kids’ potential using music as the bridge.

And our evidence of a radical improvement in the outlook for children means RTM is developing growing political clout and engagement. For example, Keir Starmer presented an RTM award to a school in his Holborn and St Pancras constituency in 2019 and other MPs such as Marsha de Cordova (Battersea), Liam Byrne (Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North) and Preet Gill (Birmingham Edgbaston) have witnessed firsthand how transformational RTM support is for schools.

The government’s Plan for Change aims to break the link between background and success. Earlier this year, the Department of Education announced a new package to support young people’s access to high-quality arts education and enrichment activities.

RTM is showing government how it’s done by meeting kids where they’re at with instruments that reflect their range of interests, cultures and languages.

Scaling up requires government commitment

Funded through our own tireless efforts, RTM has invested nearly £3 million in schools across the country.  That’s £90,000 in David Lammy’s Tottenham constituency alone, and nearly £500,000 invested in the most deprived areas of Manchester and Birmingham.

In addition, RTM provides numerous performance and industry-based opportunities for talented kids outside their curriculum-based learning. There is the RTM annual talent contest Battle of the Bands, where musicians from our funded schools compete; the talent on display is astounding. Young musicians from RTM schools also performed at the Together at Christmas carol concert in Westminster Abbey at the request of HRH The Princess of Wales.

Our aim is to expand and scale up our activity, for which we have set an ambitious target of raising an additional £3 million for musical instruments to be put in the hands of the kids over the next three years.

Meantime, RTM is committed to ensuring that music is positioned as a critical element within a whole school educational offer and that children’s development is prioritised with a fully rounded approach.

This is the Restore the Music impact and vision and the reason government takes us seriously. But the level of scale-up required for lasting social change needs a commitment from the government to mandate music education as every child’s statutory right.