Academics call on AQA to save Art History A-level

Over 100 academics have signed a letter calling on the AQA exam board to reconsider its decision to scrap the art history A-level.

AQA is currently the only exam board in the UK offering the subject and it announced last week that Art History would not be offered to new students after this year.

The letter, which was produced by the Association of Art Historians (AAH) is addressed to AQA chief executive Andrew Hall, claims that cutting the qualification ‘will result in a subject of profound social, cultural and economic importance disappearing from the UK A-level landscape’, which it warns will have ‘damaging consequences’ that will ‘stretch far beyond schools and colleges’.

The letter notes that the Art History A-level is among the most popular routes into studying the subject at University, and so its discontinuation could also have a ‘grave consequences’ for the future of the discipline in UK universities.

The AAH has called on AQA to work with it to find ‘constructive ways to address and, ultimately, to overcome any logistical issues and secure a future for the A-level’.

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