Jenny Scharf

Educated in Northern Ireland (NI), Jenny Scharf taught music in England and in NI’s religiously segregated schools. She strongly believes in an education in and through music, achieved through creative processes. After contributing to the jurisdiction’s first statutory music curriculum (1992) she joined its Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) as principal officer for music. While her responsibility lay in teacher-support materials for curriculum and external music examinations, she also worked on the development of a new statutory whole-school curriculum (2007). After retirement and with the curriculum in place for ten years, Jenny undertook a study to review teachers’ approaches to developing pupils’ ‘Mutual Understanding’, the music curriculum’s basis for addressing society’s religious and cultural differences.