Are there as many opportunities for creatives compared to STEM students at Warwick?

As an English Literature student, I am often met with surprise when I tell people what I study. The question ‘But why did you choose to study English?’ is one I have become accustomed to over the past academic year. As someone who also enjoyed STEM subjects in school, at times it has made me question whether I should have chosen a ‘safer’ degree with ‘more opportunities’ and ‘a higher salary’. However, although the University of Warwick is considered relatively STEM-based, there are still many opportunities for creative people, which reassures me that picking a humanities subject was not the ‘wrong’ decision.

For example, the Warwick Student Arts Festival (WSAF) this year clearly exemplifies Warwick’s desire to showcase its creative talent and achievement. Summarised on the WSAF website as ‘a 3-day showcase and celebration of all aspects of the arts at Warwick’, the event occurred on Saturday 8th June, Sunday 9th June and Monday 10th June 2024. Each day, there was a variety of different events and performances across campus from the morning to the evening. These included theatre, dance, music, film, literature, comedy, and art.

The university’s allocation of funding also illustrates its dedication to providing opportunities for creative students. For example, in 2021, Warwick University opened the £60 million Faculty of Arts building. Despite a cut in government funding, The University of Warwick announced in 2023 that it was opening a new site in Venice as part of a £100 million investment in the arts and humanities. In the same year, the university saw an 11% increase in applications to arts and humanities degrees.

The focus Warwick University places on the arts and humanities as well as STEM is therefore impressive

Professor Stuart Croft (Vice Chancellor of Warwick University) told FE News with the opening of the new Venice site that “We need to stop talking arts degrees down and start championing their growing value and importance”. He also claimed that the “future isn’t STEM rather than the arts – it’s very clearly both”.

The idea that STEM should be viewed in conjunction with creativity is demonstrated by the use of the term STEAM. This adds the arts to the pre-established group of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Although the STEAM acronym has been around for a while, there has recently been a rise in the use of the term as people increasingly start to consider the arts within the context of the more traditional STEM subjects.

However, many have viewed this new acronym as a bit of a joke, claiming that ultimately STEM is more important than creative fields within the context of the wider world. Although it is necessary to recognise the value of both, grouping the arts together with STEM does seem somewhat unhelpful and counterproductive.

Whilst the contribution of STEM to fields such as medicine and engineering renders it more important than the arts in many aspects of life, research has proven that the soft skills utilised in the arts also prove extremely valuable when used with the hard skills STEM students acquire.

Furthermore, the increase in the use and development of AI has demonstrated that this new technology will never be capable of truly capturing and replicating the skills required for the arts and humanities in the same way that it can assist in STEM fields.

So, perhaps the argument that there are not so many opportunities for creative people at Warwick stems from the view of some people outside of the university bubble that the arts are of lesser importance in the world. The focus Warwick University places on the arts and humanities as well as STEM is therefore impressive.

Additionally, opportunities for creative students at the university are not restricted to what the university provides (such as funding and organisation) but also involve what the institution supports and encourages. Namely, the various creative magazines, publications and societies which students have established around campus highlight the desire amongst students to channel creativity into artistic expression, thus creating their own opportunities.

Therefore, despite the preconception that people may have that Warwick focuses heavily on STEM rather than creative subjects, the emphasis it places on the arts disproves this. The allocation of funding to the arts and the celebration of creative achievements within the university reinforces how many opportunities there are for creative students.