‘Can we come to your school, please? It sounds brilliant! We were impressed by your strong, long-term commitment to the transformative power of the arts, which is making a difference to arts-based practice within school, and to other arts and teaching professionals within the local area.’

Feedback from our most recent Artsmark Platinum status 2025, awarded by Arts Council England.

Bedford High School is a Platinum Artsmark School (awarded for the second time in 2025), Lead Artsmark School, Music Mark, Royal Exchange Ambassador School and National Theatre Flagship School. The Arts Faculty is composed of Art, Dance, Drama and Music and our united vision is to ‘Bring out the best in everyone through creative thinking and expression’. This statement is at the forefront of everything we do to ensure our students have as many high-quality Arts opportunities as possible.

We run multiple courses at KS4 and over half of students at Bedford choose to study an Arts subject throughout years 10 and 11. We are proud that our students make better than national average progress in a number of our arts subjects and our data shows that for many, their arts results are their best grade on results day. We offer a broad range of extra-curricular clubs such as musical theatre, rock bands, dance clubs, choirs, painting and set design and over 300 students participate in our extra-curricular clubs on a weekly basis. These clubs culminate in shows and performances throughout the year including our Christmas Concert, Spring Showcase, Dance Show, Art Exhibition and our whole school musical.

We also take part in many community, regional and national events including Leigh Feast, Speak Up at The Lowry, Songfest, Music for Youth at the Royal Albert Hall and Wigan Dance Festival to name a few. Our Advanced Singers also do a Christmas tour every year, performing in some of Leigh’s nursing homes and in other local spaces to bring the joy of music to community members who may otherwise not be able to visit live shows.

Our cultural provision is something we are very proud of at Bedford. Students have opportunities to visit theatre performances, museums, art galleries, dance shows, music trips and take part in workshops with professional artists. We work closely with local, regional and national partnerships to ensure our students work with the best professionals in the creative industries.

Providing our young people with excellent career guidance is very important to us at Bedford and especially in our Arts faculty. The creative industries are growing faster than any other sector in the UK. Every year the UK’s creative industries contribute nearly £125 billion to the UK economy and employ over 2.4 million people. Our annual careers fair has a wide range of representatives from a vast range of careers within Expressive Arts and many of our ex-students are now thriving in the industry.

At Bedford, our students experience the highest quality arts curriculum, they are taught by some of the most experienced arts practitioners in the country and they access some of the most amazing creative experiences thanks to our strong partnerships with local, regional and national arts organisations. If you have any questions regarding the creative curriculum at Bedford High School, please don’t hesitate to email our Head of Performing Arts, Mrs Stafford, at s.stafford@bedford.wigan.sch.uk