Reimagining music for the future

Sydney Conservatorium of Music provides and fosters a broad and thorough knowledge of music and its role in society leading to transformational learning experiences.

We prepare independent and resilient music students who are sensitive to cultural difference, technical complexity and artistic diversity for work at the highest level in a musical world.

Partnerships with First Nations communities, music industries, and international peers ensure innovation in our pedagogical practices.

Our environment includes pedagogical methods of Western art music that have been cultivated over many centuries, and are reinforced by contemporary innovations to prepare our students for their diverse careers in music.

Our strategic priorities for education are to:

1. Ensure that curriculum focusing on First Nations knowledge is led by First Nations people.
2. Provide integrated, multi-faceted music programs relating to music professions, research and professional practice.
3. Focus on professional preparation for a diverse range of careers.
4. Recruit well-qualified and musically self-directed students.
5. Recognise and cultivate creative and cultural diversity.
6. Focus on innovation in all aspects of our teaching including e-learning, music technology, and entrepreneurship.
7. Enhance and recognise teaching excellence and the educational experience for staff and students.
8. Enable teaching exchanges with international partners.
9. Provide workplace opportunities and mentoring for HDR candidates.
10. Recognise the strengths of each degree program and create more opportunities for student and faculty collaborations between programs.

Sydney Conservatorium of Music supports and facilitates research excellence in music. Our research covers a diverse range of perspectives including First Nations knowledge, composition, performance, music education, musicology, music cognition, and music in societies that are vital to cultural development and heritage in Australia and worldwide.

We are international leaders in articulating multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research across artistic and traditional contexts. We continue to strengthen our knowledge of historical musical practices, providing rich contexts for our day-to-day teaching, while also developing research methodologies that aid global understanding of diverse musical cultures.

Our strategic priorities for research are to:

1. Further develop our research activity in Indigenous musics, including research led by First Nations scholars and practitioners.
2. Expand our research focusing on music of diverse cultures.
3. Develop relationships and cutting-edge research projects with key industry partners nationally and internationally.
4. Acknowledge practice-led research as embodied knowledge, and articulate the value of research-led performance.
5. Engage nationally and internationally in the development of quality metrics for artistic research and other non-traditional research outputs.
6. Communicate the importance of non-traditional research worldwide
7. Invest in and drive diverse research with an excellent track record of output and impact.
8. Build excellence and success in external funding opportunities.
9. Mentor early- and mid-career researchers through the Academic Excellence Framework.
10. Support HDR activity in areas of existing and emerging excellence.
11. Provide strategic support for multidisciplinary collaborations, and recognise the contribution of professional staff to ongoing research quality and management.
12. Lead the research narrative about the importance of the arts for Australia.

Sydney Conservatorium of Music enhances the quality of life for people locally and globally through purposeful relationships in music with communities and industries.

We build the values of diversity and inclusion through our engagement with research, teaching and professional practice. We incorporate new technologies to ensure that we have a world-wide reach.

Our strategic priorities for external engagement and reputation are to:

1. Create strategic research, teaching and performance alliances with Indigenous communities, Asia and the Pacific.
2. Be a vibrant and active music and creative research hub within the broader Australian society.
3. Contribute to local, national and global peak body discussions on music performance, research, education and creation through effective external engagement.
4. Create pathways for low SES students, especially from Western Sydney.
5. Foster interactions with local and international arts organisations and Indigenous communities that improve the quality and impact of our teaching, research, and creative practice.
6. Support the NSW Regional Conservatoriums as a major source of student recruitment and school engagement, ensuring a diversity of students in all of our programs.
7. Ensure that the Open Academy is at the centre of the local musical community.
8. Increase staff public profiles for engagement as experts in their fields.
9. Develop the use of music as a means to foster social justice through the provision of courses and experiences that enable young people and their communities to find their musical voice.

The Sydney Conservatorium of Music has developed its learning, research and creative environment for over a century. Now we seek to use innovative technology to support these practices to transform our experience of working at the University. We will:

1. Integrate our administrative systems with University best practice systems.
2. Focus on supporting researchers, creators, and teachers through investment in their professional development.
3. Attract new staff who will contribute creatively to our musical enterprise as professional or academic members of our community.
4. Ensure that SCM staff successfully integrate with new University innovations and directions.
5. Ensure that our physical spaces are attractive workplaces for staff and students.