Taking Part 2019/20: annual child release
The Taking Part Survey has run since 2005 and is the key evidence source for DCMS.
Applies to England
Documents
Details
The Taking Part Survey has run since 2005 and is the key evidence source for DCMS. It is a continuous face to face household survey of adults aged 16 and over in England and children aged 5 to 15 years old.
The adult Taking Part report can be found here.
The Taking Part Survey provides reliable national estimates of engagement with the arts, heritage, museums and libraries It carries the National Statistics badge, meaning that it meets the highest standards of statistical quality.
- Released - 16 September 2020
- Period covered - April 2019 to March 2020
- Geographic coverage - National and Regional level data for England.
- Next release date – Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, face-to-face data collection was paused for the survey year from April 2020. Data will therefore not be published in the normal annual report in September 2021.
Summary
The Taking Part Survey provides reliable national estimates of adult engagement with the arts, heritage, museums, libraries, digital and social networking and of barriers to engagement. The latest data cover the period April 2019 to March 2020.
Child engagement in competitive sports is available in the Child data tables. Competition is a key element of sport, however Sport England research shows that competition should not be the sole or main focus for children, and that fun and enjoyment are the most influential factors in getting and keeping children active. We therefore point towards the new Active Lives Children and Young People Survey which takes a broader approach to measuring young people’s engagement in sport and physical activity, reflecting the importance of competitive sport as well as individual or collaborative approaches to sport and physical activity.
Fieldwork for the Taking Part survey was terminated before its intended end date due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. We do not expect that either the pandemic or reduced fieldwork has affected the accuracy of our estimates. A summary of the analysis of the possible effects of early termination of fieldwork can be found the Taking Part Year 15 technical report
The previous Taking Part release was published on 19 September 2019, covering the period April 2018 to March 2019.
The pre-release access document above contains a list of ministers and officials who have received privileged early access to this release of Taking Part data. In line with best practice, the list has been kept to a minimum and those given access for briefing purposes had a maximum of 24 hours. Details on the pre-release access arrangements for this dataset are available in the accompanying material.
This release is published in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics (2018), as produced by the UK Statistics Authority. The Authority has the overall objective of promoting and safeguarding.
the production and publication of official statistics that serve the public good. It monitors and reports on all official statistics, and promotes good practice in this area.
The responsible statistician for this release is Harry Smart. For enquiries on this release, contact takingpart@dcms.gov.uk.
Headline measures
Taking Part is a household survey in England that measures engagement with the cultural sectors. The survey data is widely used by policy officials, practitioners, academics and charities. This report presents the latest headline estimates of children (5-15 year olds) engagement for the year April 2019 to March 2020.
In 2019/20, the following proportions of children had engaged with cultural activities in the last 12 months:
- 96% engaged with the arts
- 66% visited a heritage site
- 59% visited a museum or gallery
- 61% visited a library